This paper examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the electricity consumption and economic growth nexus using 30 European countries' quarterly data between 2015Q1 and 2021Q3. We employ the panel unit root, panel causality, and dynamic panel estimation tests and find that there is bi-directional causality between electricity consumption and economic growth. The findings of this study provide new insights into understanding the electricity consumption and economic growth nexus by suggesting that an increase in electricity consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic decreases economic growth. We also investigate the strict confinement period of the COVID-19 pandemic as a robustness test. The results of robustness analysis reveal that there is an even stronger negative impact of electricity consumption on economic growth due to the pandemic influenza mitigation strategies such as lockdowns and business' shutdowns that cause people to intensely consume residential electricity.

Keywords: COVID-19 pandemic; Economic growth; Electricity consumption; Panel causality test.

© 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

本文利用2015年第一季度至2021年第三季度30个欧洲国家的季度数据，研究了COVID-19大流行对电力消费和经济增长关系的影响。我们运用面板单位根、面板因果关系和动态面板估计检验方法，发现电力消费与经济增长之间存在双向因果关系。本研究结果为理解电力消费和经济增长的关系提供了新的见解，表明在COVID-19疫情期间，电力消费的增加会减少经济增长。我们也通过严格的封控期作为稳健性测试进行了进一步的研究。稳健性分析的结果显示，由于疫情防控措施如封锁和企业停业导致人们大量使用家庭用电，疫情对经济的影响更为显著。

关键词：
COVID-19大流行；经济发展；电力消耗；面板因果关系检验。

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