泰國能源與經濟發展的思路與策略

A Study of Energy Policy and Economic Growth in Thailand

本文使用英國石油公司的能源資料庫與世界銀行資料庫，採用向量自迴歸模型來估計19991年至2019年的經濟成長、資本使用量、勞動量以及能源消耗（含非再生能源與再生能源）之間的因果關係。結果顯示，非再生能源消耗會帶動經濟成長的變化，但經濟成長無法解釋非再生能源消耗會帶動經濟成長的變化，但是經濟成長無法解釋非再生能源消耗的變化，即單向因果關係；然而，再生能源消耗與經濟成長存在雙向因果關係。泰國在再生能源的發展上具有幾項優勢：（1）環境面，處於熱帶地區，擁有充足日照，具備太陽能發展潛力；（2）產業結構面，屬於農業出口國，停工生質能源的燃料來源；（3）投資面，2020年泰國經商環境排名全球第21名。換句話說，透過推動再生能源的相關政策，除了帶來經濟成長的好處外。泰國同時也努力在2030年前，達成永續發展指標中「確保所有的人都可取得負擔得起、可靠、永續及現代的能源」的目標。

This article uses the British Petroleum Energy database and the World Bank database to estimate the causal relationship between economic growth, capital, labor, and energy consumption, including non-renewable and renewable energy, from 1999 to 2019 by using Vector Autoregression Model. The results show that non-renewable energy consumption will drive the change of economic growth, but economic growth can’t explain the change of non-renewable energy consumption. However, there is a two-way causal relationship between renewable energy consumption and economic growth. Thailand has several advantages in the development of renewable energy: (1) For environment, it is located in the tropical region with sufficient sunshine and has the development potential of solar energy; (2) For industrial structure, belonging to agricultural exporting countries and having sources for biomass energy; (3) For investment, Thailand ranked 21st in terms of Ease of Doing Business in 2020. In other words, Thailand is on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals of “affordable and clean energy” by 2030.