DECOMPOSITION OF INDUSTRIAL ENERGY-CONSUMPTION - THE ENERGY INTENSITYAPPROACH

Two recent papers have dealt with several methodological and applicati on issues related to the technique of decomposing changes in industria l energy consumption. In this paper, we examine these issues in the co ntext of another commonly adopted approach to decomposition, ie decomp osing changes in aggregate energy intensity for industry. The scope of our study includes two general parametric Divisia methods, a unified decomposition framework, five specific decomposition methods and metho d selection in actual application. We show that decomposition can be d one in an infinite number of ways and some previously proposed decompo sition methods using the energy intensity approach are special cases o f the two general parametric Divisia methods. We also compare the ener gy intensity approach with the energy consumption approach to decompos ition in actual application. Results of application studies using Sing apore and Taiwan data are presented to illustrate the issues raised.