Does public capital expenditure reduce energy poverty? Evidence from Nigeria
International Journal of Energy Sector Management
ISSN: 1750-6220
Article publication date: 8 June 2022
Issue publication date: 18 May 2023
Abstract
Purpose
Given the ever-growing fiscal commitments of Nigeria and her chequered history of electricity generation and distribution, the fortunes of the energy sector in the country have been affected by the prevalence of energy poverty. Government policies such as public capital expenditure (PCE) present a crucial option for reducing energy poverty in Nigeria, providing the purpose of this study.
Design/methodology/approach
To investigate the relationship between government capital spending and five distinct energy poverty proxies, this research applies the Bayer–Hanck cointegration system and the auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) bound test.
Findings
The findings indicate that public capital spending in Nigeria worsens energy poverty by reducing access to electricity, urban electrification, renewable energy consumption and renewable electricity generation, with a positive but insignificant influence on rural electrification.
Originality/value
This inquiry presents a pioneering investigation of the nexus between PCE and energy poverty in Nigeria. Also, aside from the variables of energy poverty adopted by existing studies, this study incorporates renewable energy consumption and renewable electricity output with implications for energy poverty and sustainable development.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors appreciate the anonymous reviewers’ and the participants at the January 2022 seminar organized by the Department of Economics, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Nigeria for the thoughtful observations and constructive comments.
Citation
Dimnwobi, S.K., Onuoha, F.C., Uzoechina, B.I., Ekesiobi, C.S. and Nwokoye, E.S. (2023), "Does public capital expenditure reduce energy poverty? Evidence from Nigeria", International Journal of Energy Sector Management, Vol. 17 No. 4, pp. 717-738. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJESM-03-2022-0008
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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