June 28, 2022 Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 Responses of the Electricity Sector in 120 Economies to the COVID-19 Pandemic Valentina Saltane, Viktoriya Ereshchenko, Shoghik Hovhannisyan and Justice Tei Mensah* T his Brief provides descriptive evidence of the operational and policy responses of the electricity sector in 120 economies to the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, to assess the intensity of operational and regulatory actions taken in response to the pandemic, the Brief proposes a COVID-19 electricity sector response measure. is measure comprises seven equally weighted variables that capture either utilities’ or utility regulators’ responses to the pandemic as well as domestic lockdown measures. Data show that most utilities continued issuing new electricity connections for businesses amid the pandemic. In most cases, utilities that continued issuing new electricity connections despite national lockdowns were able to do so due to well-established electronic and automated processes. In general, maintenance works and planned outages continued during the onset of the pandemic, although with some delays and exceptions. Increasingly, delayed electricity payments and defaults became more prevalent, especially among developing economies. Hence, numerous utilities modi ed tari and payment schedules to provide economic relief to clients. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted power electricity was one of the essential sectors allowed to continue sectors worldwide operations despite the prevalence of the pandemic. e COVID-19 pandemic has led to severe economic crises and a A deterioration in household welfare led to defaults and late deterioration in public welfare, especially in developing countries with payments of electricity bills in nearly 60 percent of the measured limited resources and acute challenges. e pandemic has also caused economies, with South Asia and Latin America reporting the highest more disruptions to the energy sector than any other event in recent average levels. To mitigate the impact of the crisis, governments history since the Great Depression. e 2020 economic downturn in the around the world introduced measures to reduce or “freeze” tari s and electricity sector was eight times larger than that of the global nancial postpone electricity payments. Overall, high-income economies crisis of 2009 and the disruptive impact is expected to be felt for years to introduced more COVID-19 response measures in their electricity come, the International Energy Agency (IEA) reports (IEA 2020a). sectors than other income groups. According to the IEA’s December 2020 Electricity Market Report Low-income economies introduced relatively (IEA 2020b), in that year, global demand for energy dropped by 2 percent. In response to the rapid spread of COVID-19 during the rst fewer COVID-19 response measures in the half of 2020, many economies imposed strict lockdown measures, electricity sector compared to high-income ones resulting in business closures and suspension of nonessential activities. To assess the intensity of operational and/or regulatory actions ese measures disrupted operations of businesses across economic taken in response to the pandemic, this Brief proposes a COVID-19 sectors, including power utilities, which provide essential services to electricity sector response measure. e measure comprises seven businesses and households. equally weighted variables that capture either utilities’ or utility is Brief uses novel research data on measures undertaken by regulators’ responses to the pandemic and domestic lockdowns. e electricity distribution utilities in the 120 most populous economies to measure’s components include the issuance of new connections; study electricity sector responses to the early stages of the COVID-19 postponement of grid infrastructure maintenance projects; pandemic (Box 1). modi cations of planned outages; extension of electricity service provision time frames; changes to electricity tari s; changes to payment e data (collected as of May 1, 2020) focus on electricity schedules; and the issuance of electricity subsidies. e measure is connection processes and time frames, maintenance and upgrade work, calculated as the share of these categories that were implemented in the planned outage schedules, changes in payment schedule and defaults, country. electricity tari s, and subsidies. ese measures range in scope and intensity across di erent economies. Power utilities continued issuing e measure merely captures the intensity of electricity sectors’ new connections and conducting electricity infrastructure maintenance responses to the pandemic and hence should not be interpreted as and upgrades in more than 60 percent of the covered economies, as either positive or negative, since di erent countries face di erent *Affiliations: World Bank, Development Economics; IFC, Development Impact. For correspondence: vsaltane@worldbank.org. Acknowledgements: The Brief is based on the data collected by Youmna Al-Hourani, Viktoriya Ereshchenko, Rinat Kapev, Francisca Isabel Filipe Patricio, Lavanya Lal, Silvia Carolina Lopez Rocha, and Valentina Saltane. The authors are grateful to Elcin Akcura, David C. Francis, Norman V. Loayza, Camilo Mondragon-Velez, Emelly Mutambatsere, and Valeria Perotti for reviewing the Brief, and to Nancy Morrison for editorial assistance. Objective and disclaimer: This Brief uses novel and unique data collected by the Development Economics Indicators Group to provide descriptive evidence of the operational and policy responses of the electricity sector in 120 economies to the COVID-19 pandemic. These Briefs carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the World Bank Group, its Executive Directors, or the governments they represent. All Briefs in the series can be accessed via: https://www.worldbank.org/en/research/brief/global-indicators-briefs-series. https://www.worldbank.org/en/research/brief/global-indicators-briefs-series. DECIG – Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 Box 1 Data collection and composition For the world’s most populous economies, the World Bank’s India, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Russian Development Economics Indicators Group conducted research on Federation, and the United States. economy-wide e ects of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent government response measures. In the case of the electricity sector, e collected data are limited to the early stages of the the data were collected by administering questionnaires to all the pandemic—data collection commenced in February 2020 and major utilities in 120 economies. In addition, the data on nished by June 2020. Considering the unpredictable nature of interruption of services at the electricity utilities were collected for COVID-19, the same economy could go into lockdown several the main business city in 191 economies, as well as for the second times. Hence, these data give only a preliminary picture of the largest business city in 11 economies: Bangladesh, Brazil, China, impact of COVID-19 on utilities’ services and operations. e following are the ten main questions administered to the utilities (excluding more detailed sub-questions): 1. Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, have there been any government-issued regulatory restrictions that impacted provision of nonemergency new electricity connections for businesses? 2. Is the utility doing nonessential new commercial electricity connections during the quarantine period or are such connections postponed? 3. What are considered to be essential electricity services? 4. Have infrastructure maintenance and upgrade projects been postponed? If yes, for how long? 5. Have the schedules for planned outages been modi ed? 6. Have the time frames to provide services related to electricity connection processes been extended? 7. Has there been a higher incidence of defaults/late payments than usual due to COVID-19? 8. Have electricity tari s for commercial customers been a ected? 9. Is the utility taking any measures to change/postpone electricity tari payment schedules for commercial customers? 10. Is the utility receiving any short-term government subsidies to be able to continue steady operations? When responses to questions were unclear or contradictory, the they were treated as missing data. e response rate to the data collection team conducted extensive follow-up by email or over questionnaire was 96 percent. All the economies covered by the data the phone. In cases where answers could not be clari ed/reconciled, collection exercise are listed in table 1 at the end of the Brief. regulatory and operational challenges. For example, in a high-income operational and regulatory response to the pandemic within electricity country, with modern and robust electricity infrastructure, sectors than low-income ones (Figure 1, panel a). Similarly, regional postponement of grid infrastructure maintenance projects in response results demonstrate that utilities and utility regulators in East Asia and to COVID-19 should not pose any problems. Conversely, in a country the Paci c, Europe and Central Asia, and the Organisation for with an already unreliable electricity supply and dilapidated Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) high-income infrastructure, postponement of maintenance works might cause group took more measures in response to the pandemic’s impact on the further structural damage and power cuts. Extension of timeframes to electricity sector than elsewhere in the world. By region, the index provide services related to electricity connection processes can also be ranges from the lowest in the Middle East and North Africa region to more feasible in countries with sound electricity infrastructure where the highest in East Asia and the Paci c (Figure 1, panel b). power supply emergencies and power grid malfunction are less frequent. Similar reasoning can be applied to modi cations of planned As implied by the pattern across income groups, the COVID-19 outages as well as other components of the measure. Low-income electricity sector response measure has a positive relationship with economies also tend to be more vulnerable to COVID 19-induced economies’ GDP per capita in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, power supply disruptions due to sta shortages, limited electronic indicating that electricity utilities and policy makers in wealthier service penetration and lack of nancial liquidity. Such challenges may economies demonstrated a stronger response to the pandemic’s impact constrain the ability to enact the needed policy response measures and on the electricity sector. Furthermore, the response to the pandemic in shift priorities within a short timeframe. the electricity sector measure is positively correlated with the Oxford COVID-19 government response index (Figure 2, panel a). e An analysis with the COVID-19 electricity sector response government response index includes policies such as government measure shows that high-income economies had a relatively stronger income support to the unemployed, debt/contract relief for households, Figure 1 The COVID-19 electricity sector response measure varies across income groups and regions a. By income group b. By region East Asia & Pacific Low income Europe & Central Asia Lower middle income High income: OECD Latin America & Caribbean Upper middle income South Asia Sub-Saharan Africa High income Middle East & North Africa 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 COVID-19 electricity sector response measure COVID-19 electricity sector response measure Source: World Bank, Global Indicators research database. Note: Higher scores on the index indicate a greater response in more areas. OECD = Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. 2 DECIG – Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 Figure 2 The COVID-19 electricity sector response measure is correlated with the OXFORD COVID-19 indexes a. Correlation with the Oxford government response index b. Correlation with the Oxford economic support index Covid-19 Electricity sector response measure Covid-19 Electricity sector response measure 100 100 80 80 60 60 40 y = 0.2766x + 23.023 40 R² = 0.02566 y = 0.1626x + 32.541 20 20 R² = 0.05479 0 20 40 60 80 100 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Oxford government response index Oxford economic support index Source: World Bank, Global Indicators research database. Note: Higher scores on the index indicate a greater response in more areas. OECD = Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. school and workplace closures, stay at home requirements, and Some developing economies fully stopped the issuance of new international travel controls. e COVID-19 electricity sector electricity connections, or they allowed new connections only for response measure is also correlated with the Oxford economic support essential sectors such as health care or food supply. For example, index (Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker) (Hale et among economies in the Latin America and Caribbean region, the al. 2021). erefore, it is reasonable to assume that the information Dominican Republic and Peru provided only high-priority captured by the COVID-19 electricity sector response measure is connections, including those to hospital centers, national security aligned with other measures of government responses to the pandemic. agencies, emergency services, armed forces, national police, civil defense, food trade, sewage and water services, telecommunications, Most utilities continued issuing new electricity ports, and airports. connections for businesses amid the pandemic With many nationwide full and partial lockdowns, about one-quarter of utilities worldwide extended the time frames for With the onset of the pandemic, one challenge faced by electricity providing electricity connection services due to pandemic-induced sector across the world was to continue the uninterrupted issuance of delays. Across income groups, the extension of connection time frames new electricity connections. e process of receiving a new connection was most prevalent in upper-middle and high-income economies. At includes submission of applications, signing contracts with electricity the same time, extensions and delays ranged from 20–30 days in utilities, all necessary inspections, clearances from the distribution Rwanda to several months in Pakistan. utility as well as from other agencies, and the external and nal connection works. In the rst half of 2020, however, new electricity Maintenance works and planned outages connections continued to be issued in the majority of economies and continued globally in most economies, although across di erent income groups: in 80 percent of surveyed low-income to a lesser extent economies; in nearly 70 percent of upper-middle-income and low-income and in more than 60 percent of lower-middle-income. In contrast to the provision of new electricity connections, a large share of utilities worldwide postponed grid upgrade and maintenance In many such economies, the continuity of issuing new electricity work, following regulatory guidelines to limit nonessential services. A connections was less a ected by the pandemic because the electricity notable exception by region is Sub-Saharan Africa, where 75 percent of sector provides essential services to di erent sectors of the economy. As utilities in the surveyed economies continued with their routine a result, power distributors continued to operate near full capacity and operations (Figure 3). Electricity-related services in the region were provided new connections without any major disruptions. For largely considered essential during the pandemic, though at the time of instance, the Czech Republic continued rendering full services despite the surveys most economies were not in lockdowns. In contrast, half of social distancing measures and a national lockdown, although some the economies in the Latin America and Caribbean region halted grid customers experienced delays in receiving new connections due to upgrade and electricity infrastructure maintenance projects. limited personnel. In fact, public utilities in the country were able to In the rst months of the pandemic, schedules for planned outages provide 90 percent of their services, except the metering of smaller (such as outages to perform maintenance, repairs, and installation works customers and households as well as physical operation of customer on the electricity network) remained completely unchanged in the service centers. Middle East and North Africa region. Further, power utilities in less Many utilities that continued issuing new electricity connections than 50 percent of economies in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and despite national lockdowns were able to do so due to well-established Caribbean, and East Asia and Paci c modi ed planned outage schedules. For example, in Colombia planned outages that did not have electronic and automated processes. For example, in Azerbaijan, ASAN any direct impact on customers were carried forward, while those that service centers, a state agency making public services more accessible to required substantial system interruptions were put on hold. Many more citizens using modern technologies, never stopped processing new utilities in high-income economies (53 percent) modi ed outage online applications, and regular connection services were granted schedules, especially nonessential ones, than in low-income ones (21 without any major delays or disruptions. Likewise, during initial surges percent). In particular, Turkey made changes to power shutdown of COVID-19, electricity grid companies in Ukraine were issuing new schedules, postponing repair work of electric networks, such as cable commercial electricity connections in nearly the same way as before the power lines, transformer stations, and substations. Also, in Ireland, no pandemic. DTEK Kyiv Electric Networks ceased receiving in-person planned outages during the quarantine period were permitted as more customers at service centers but continued providing services remotely emphasis was placed on avoiding widespread domestic outages due to through online platforms and electronic communication. home working and schooling. 3 DECIG – Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 Figure 3 Project upgrades and modification of planned outages varied by region East Asia & Pacific Europe & Central Asia High income: OECD Latin America & Caribbean Sub-Saharan Africa Middle East & North Africa South Asia 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% Share of economies where planned outages were modified Share of economies that did not postpone infrastructure projects Source: World Bank, Global Indicators research database. Note: OECD = Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Delayed payments and defaults increased for Around 30 percent of economies in South Asia and Latin America electricity utilities during the early stage of the and Caribbean regions also implemented measures a ecting electricity tari s. Utilities in India and Nepal waived parts of electricity tari s for pandemic the duration of lockdowns. In Honduras, in the rst half of 2020, Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, delays in electricity payments electricity tari s for commercial customers were reduced by more than and even defaults have been widespread across all regions. Among the 15 percent. Conversely, electricity tari reductions were the exception economies in the sample, those in the South Asia region recorded the in Europe and Central Asia. Only Serbia reduced electricity tari s highest incidence of delayed payments and defaults. In Bangladesh, for during the pandemic and did so by 16 to 23 percent, while Romania example, even nancially viable customers were not able to pay issued a regulation prohibiting suppliers from increasing electricity electricity bills because most commercial bank branches remained tari s (Military Ordinance no. 4/2020, published in the O cial closed. As a result, the monthly revenues of the Dhaka Electric Supply Gazette Part I, No. 257 of 29 March 2020). Company (DESCO) plummeted, which adversely a ected DESCO’s Across all income groups, policy measures related to electricity ability to pay the bulk electricity supplier, the Bangladesh Power tari s were most heavily implemented in higher-income economies, Development Board. At the same time, more than 85 percent of whereas in lower-income ones such measures were considerably less economies in the Latin America and Caribbean region experienced widespread (Figure 4). A possible explanation for this could be that higher incidences of defaults and nonpayments by all types of utilities in low-income economies have less liquidity and nancial customers. is was largely driven by a general slowdown of economic reserves to o set tari rate reductions during the crisis. Before the activity, social distancing measures, and curfews, coupled with rising pandemic, energy subsidies already amounted to 5–10 percent of GDP levels of unemployment. in some economies, accounting for a signi cant share of scal de cits As some economies adopted regulations to allow customers to and exacerbating public indebtedness (Rzeczpospolita 2014). In defer electricity bill payments, the number of delayed payments general, governments in lower-income economies have limited scal naturally increased. In Honduras, the Empresa de Energía de resources and hence are less likely to o er tari reduction or Honduras (EEH) reported a 30 percent decline year-on-year in bill postponement, which was also the case during the COVID-19 collection revenues between March and May 2020. Likewise, higher pandemic (Clements and Parry 2018). incidences of defaults and delayed payments were reported in around Before the pandemic, many economies had already been indirectly 60 percent of economies in Europe and Central Asia and among the subsidizing electricity supply and power generation. According to a OECD members. In the case of a Kazakhstan’s power supply company, World Bank study on Sub-Saharan Africa, o cial electricity tari s in overdue payments increased by almost 29 percent compared to a many African economies often did not even cover operational costs corresponding period of the previous year. In Serbia, the total bill (Kojima, Bacon, and Trimble 2014). While energy price subsidies can collection rate was reported to be 30 percent lower than before the provide nancial relief to households and businesses, they do not pandemic. discriminate recipients based on nancial need and social status. A study of 32 developing countries found that energy price subsidies tend Electricity tariffs and payment schedules were to largely bene t high-income households: the richest 20 percent of modified to offer economic relief to businesses households bene t over six times more from tari reductions than the and households in many economies poorest 20 percent (Coady, Flamini, and Sears 2015). Instead, utilities could take more targeted measures to lower the nancial burden for During the rst wave of the pandemic governments worldwide certain customers, including poor households, households in informal took measures to either reduce or avoid increases in electricity tari s to settlements, or those that use little electricity, through preferential mitigate nancial burdens on businesses and households. About 70 subsidies (Komives et al. 2005). percent of economies in East Asia and the Paci c implemented measures a ecting electricity tari s at least during lockdown periods As of May 1, 2020, only 17 economies o ered short-term, (map 1). In Cambodia and Lao PDR, residential electricity tari s have pandemic-driven government subsidies to electricity utilities. None of been reduced by 10 percent. Utilities in other economies in the the OECD member states, for example, introduced nancial support region—including China; Hong Kong SAR, China; and packages for electricity utilities. Conversely, in Europe and Central Malaysia—have also reduced tari s for business customers. Likewise, Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa about one-quarter of electricity utilities almost half of the OECD high-income economies either reduced or received at least some short-term government subsidies to be able to froze electricity charges. continue steady operations amid the pandemic. For example, 4 DECIG – Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 Map 1 Many economies modified electricity tariffs or postponed bill payment schedules, or did both Source: World Bank, Global Indicators research database. Question on whether electricity tariffs were affected; Question on whether the utility was taking any measures to change/postpone electricity tariff payment schedules for commercial customers. Azerbaijan’s utility, Azerishiq OJSC, received subsidies as million residents (IMF). India’s government provided a nancial relief compensation for discounted prices provided to customers during the package for the power sector with a three-month moratorium on pandemic. Notably, in terms of income level, short-term subsidies to state-owned electricity distribution companies to make payments for the electricity utilities were mostly provided in low-income economies. bought electricity (Mint 2020). e government in Ghana took a decision to absorb most of the electricity costs during the lockdown Some governments provided direct nancial support to utilities periods (BBC 2020). And in Burkina Faso, the government introduced during the pandemic. According to the IFC’s research, in eight out of a 50% reduction in electricity bills and canceled penalties on invoices 67 sampled countries - Brazil, Colombia, India, Mexico, Pakistan, by the country’s major utility companies (Présidence du Faso 2020). Peru, South Africa and South Korea – governments provided either direct or indirect liquidity support to utilities. In addition, in 29 economies (43 percent of the sample) governments o ered budget Conclusion support to utilities, mostly targeting consumer tari s (Apfalter et al. During the rst months of the pandemic, di erent countries faced 2020). In 2020, the Pakistani federal government introduced a relief di erent economic and social realities and regulatory policy responses package equivalent to 2.9 percent of GDP with one of the key measures within electricity sectors varied considerably across regions and income being electricity bill payment relief. In Afghanistan, the government groups. Despite this heterogeneity, the new data do reveal some waived electricity bills of less than Af 1,000 (US$ 13) for Kabul’s notable trends and conclusions. Not surprisingly, electricity households for a two-month period, which bene ted more than 1.5 connection services were less distorted in economies with Figure 4 Tariff reductions and postponements benefited high-income customers the most a. Tariffs affected, mean b. Tariff schedules changed, mean 0.6 0.9 0.83 0.52 0.8 0.5 Tariff schedules changed 0.7 Tariffs affected, mean 0.64 0.62 0.4 0.6 0.33 0.5 0.47 0.3 0.24 0.4 0.21 0.2 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.1 0 0 4th quartile 3rd quartile 2nd quartile 1st quartile 4th quartile 3rd quartile 2nd quartile 1st quartile Source: World Bank, Global Indicators research database. Question on whether electricity tariffs were affected; Question on whether the utility was taking any measures to change/postpone electricity tariff payment schedules for commercial customers; World Development Indicators: GNI per capita (Atlas method) for 2019 5 DECIG – Global Indicators Briefs No. 8 The 120 economies that responded to the COVID-19 electricity sector regulatory response Table 1 questionnaire Afghanistan Congo, Rep. Iran, Islamic Rep. New Zealand Spain Algeria Costa Rica Iraq Nicaragua Sri Lanka Angola Côte d'Ivoire Ireland Niger Sudan Argentina Czech Republic Israel Nigeria Sweden Australia Denmark Italy Norway Switzerland Austria Dominican Republic Japan Pakistan Syrian Arab Republic Azerbaijan Ecuador Jordan Papua New Guinea Taiwan, China Bangladesh Egypt, Arab Rep. Kazakhstan Paraguay Tajikistan Belarus El Salvador Kenya Peru Tanzania Belgium Eritrea Korea, Rep. Philippines Thailand Benin Ethiopia Kyrgyz Republic Poland Togo Bolivia Finland Lao PDR Portugal Tunisia Brazil France Lebanon Romania Turkey Bulgaria Germany Libya Russian Federation Uganda Burkina Faso Ghana Madagascar Rwanda Ukraine Burundi Greece Malawi Saudi Arabia United Arab Emirates Cambodia Guatemala Malaysia Senegal United Kingdom Cameroon Guinea Mali Serbia United States Canada Haiti Mexico Sierra Leone Uzbekistan Chad Honduras Morocco Singapore Venezuela, RB Chile Hong Kong SAR, China Mozambique Slovak Republic Vietnam China Hungary Myanmar Somalia Yemen, Rep. Colombia India Nepal South Africa Zambia Congo, Dem. Rep. Indonesia Netherlands South Sudan Zimbabwe well-functioning and advanced electronic platforms. Maintenance electricity distribution and generation networks, high-income work and planned outages were put on hold in most middle- and economies with stronger electricity market fundamentals were able to high-income economies, while the majority of low-income economies o set the impact of the pandemic and national lockdown measures on could not a ord to delay these processes signi cantly. Measures to the electricity sector more e ectively than the middle- and low-income modify electricity tari s and postpone bill payment schedules were ones. Follow-up rounds of data collection could be implemented to pursued mostly in the richest quartile of global economies during the gain a better understanding of how power sectors worldwide have rst wave of the pandemic. Overall, due to better resilience of their adapted to operating during the pandemic as it has proceeded. References Apfalter, Stefan; Hommes, Martin; Pereira Mendes, Miguel; Toba, IMF (International Monetary Fund). 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