IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cep/sercdp/serddp0126.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Importance of Time Zone Assignment: Evidence from Residential Electricity Consumption

Author

Listed:
  • Felix Weinhardt

Abstract

This paper presents the first nationwide empirical assessment of residential electricity use in response to the timing of daylight. Employing Geographical Information Systems (GIS) solar times of sunrise and sunset are calculated for all geographical locations in mainland USA. This is used to uncover the non-standard variation in sunrise times in standard local time over space, depending on time zone, daylight saving time, and geographical position within time zone. This variation is subsequently used to uncover county-level responses in residential electricity consumption to changes in sunlight. I find no robust overall effect of sunrise times, but early sunrise is associated with lower residential electricity use in the North, but higher consumption in the South. These results would suggest that additionally splitting the USA into time-zones horizontally could reduce the total annual residential electricity bill, but further research is needed to examine the behavioral channels that could give rise to these effects.

Suggested Citation

  • Felix Weinhardt, 2013. "The Importance of Time Zone Assignment: Evidence from Residential Electricity Consumption," SERC Discussion Papers serddp0126, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:sercdp:serddp0126
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/sercdp0126.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lisa A. Kramer & Mark J. Kamstra & Maurice D. Levi, 2000. "Losing Sleep at the Market: The Daylight Saving Anomaly," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 1005-1011, September.
    2. Kellogg, Ryan & Wolff, Hendrik, 2008. "Daylight time and energy: Evidence from an Australian experiment," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 56(3), pages 207-220, November.
    3. Aries, Myriam B.C. & Newsham, Guy R., 2008. "Effect of daylight saving time on lighting energy use: A literature review," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 1858-1866, June.
    4. Joshua D. Angrist, 1998. "Estimating the Labor Market Impact of Voluntary Military Service Using Social Security Data on Military Applicants," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(2), pages 249-288, March.
    5. Matthew J. Kotchen & Laura E. Grant, 2011. "Does Daylight Saving Time Save Energy? Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Indiana," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(4), pages 1172-1185, November.
    6. Sood Neeraj & Ghosh Arkadipta, 2007. "The Short and Long Run Effects of Daylight Saving Time on Fatal Automobile Crashes," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-22, February.
    7. Daniel S. Hamermesh & Caitlin Knowles Myers & Mark L. Pocock, 2008. "Cues for Timing and Coordination: Latitude, Letterman, and Longitude," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(2), pages 223-246, April.
    8. Marjit, Sugata, 2007. "Trade theory and the role of time zones," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 153-160.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Havranek, Tomas & Herman, Dominik & Irsova, Zuzana, 2016. "Does Daylight Saving Save Energy? A Meta-Analysis," MPRA Paper 74518, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Tomas Havranek & Dominik Herman & Zuzana Irsova, 2018. "Does Daylight Saving Save Electricity? A Meta-Analysis," The Energy Journal, , vol. 39(2), pages 35-61, March.
    3. Bergland, Olvar & Mirza, Faisal, 2017. "Latitudinal Effect on Energy Savings from Daylight Savings Time," Working Paper Series 08-2017, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, School of Economics and Business.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Guven, Cahit & Yuan, Haishan & Zhang, Quanda & Aksakalli, Vural, 2021. "When does daylight saving time save electricity? Weather and air-conditioning," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    2. Nicholas Rivers, 2018. "Does Daylight Savings Time Save Energy? Evidence from Ontario," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 70(2), pages 517-543, June.
    3. Christian Bünnings & Valentin Schiele, 2021. "Spring Forward, Don't Fall Back: The Effect of Daylight Saving Time on Road Safety," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 103(1), pages 165-176, March.
    4. Jin, L. & Ziebarth, N.R., 2015. "Sleep and Human Capital: Evidence from Daylight Saving Time," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 15/27, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    5. Jin, Lawrence & Ziebarth, Nicolas R., 2015. "Does Daylight Saving Time Really Make Us Sick?," IZA Discussion Papers 9088, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Jonathan James, 2023. "Let there be light: Daylight saving time and road traffic collisions," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 61(3), pages 523-545, July.
    7. Tomas Havranek & Dominik Herman & Zuzana Irsova, 2018. "Does Daylight Saving Save Electricity? A Meta-Analysis," The Energy Journal, , vol. 39(2), pages 35-61, March.
    8. Hugo Salas & Pedro Ignacio Hancevic, 2023. "The unexpected effects of daylight-saving time: Traffic accidents in Mexican municipalities," EconoQuantum, Revista de Economia y Finanzas, Universidad de Guadalajara, Centro Universitario de Ciencias Economico Administrativas, Departamento de Metodos Cuantitativos y Maestria en Economia., vol. 20(1), pages 1-29, Enero-Jun.
    9. Herber, Stefanie P. & Quis, Johanna Sophie & Heineck, Guido, 2017. "Does the transition into daylight saving time affect students’ performance?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 130-139.
    10. Havranek, Tomas & Herman, Dominik & Irsova, Zuzana, 2016. "Does Daylight Saving Save Energy? A Meta-Analysis," MPRA Paper 74518, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Eric Jonathon Osborne‐Christenson, 2022. "Saving light, losing lives: How daylight saving time impacts deaths from suicide and substance abuse," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(S2), pages 40-68, October.
    12. Choi, Seungmoon & Pellen, Alistair & Masson, Virginie, 2017. "How does daylight saving time affect electricity demand? An answer using aggregate data from a natural experiment in Western Australia," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 247-260.
    13. Kudela, Peter & Havranek, Tomas & Herman, Dominik & Irsova, Zuzana, 2020. "Does daylight saving time save electricity? Evidence from Slovakia," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    14. Matthew J. Kotchen & Laura E. Grant, 2011. "Does Daylight Saving Time Save Energy? Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Indiana," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(4), pages 1172-1185, November.
    15. Joan Costa‐Font & Sarah Fleche & Ricardo Pagan, 2024. "The welfare effects of time reallocation: evidence from Daylight Saving Time," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(362), pages 547-568, April.
    16. Osea Giuntella & Wei Han & Fabrizio Mazzonna, 2017. "Circadian Rhythms, Sleep, and Cognitive Skills: Evidence From an Unsleeping Giant," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 54(5), pages 1715-1742, October.
    17. Flores, Daniel & Luna, Edgar M., 2019. "An econometric evaluation of daylight saving time in Mexico," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).
    18. López, Miguel, 2020. "Daylight effect on the electricity demand in Spain and assessment of Daylight Saving Time policies," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    19. Bergland, Olvar & Mirza, Faisal, 2017. "Latitudinal Effect on Energy Savings from Daylight Savings Time," Working Paper Series 08-2017, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, School of Economics and Business.
    20. Kountouris, Yiannis & Remoundou, Kyriaki, 2014. "About time: Daylight Saving Time transition and individual well-being," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(1), pages 100-103.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    time-use; time zones; daylight saving; energy consumption; GIS;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H4 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods
    • Q4 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cep:sercdp:serddp0126. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/publications/serc-papers/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.