Use electricity wisely, says government as demand still at record levels

NEW DELHI: A day after peak power demand broke all previous records and reached the projected level of 271 gigawatts (GW), the power ministry on Friday urged citizens to use electricity "wisely and judiciously".

The ministry said the intense heatwave sweeping the country had pushed electricity demand to record levels over the last four days. "Although we are prepared to supply electricity as required, due to the intense summer, let us all try to use electricity wisely and judiciously," the ministry said on X.

Officials said the intense cooling load exerts pressure on the system. While the daytime peak is being handled by 150 GW of installed solar capacity, which takes over nearly one-third of the total load, the grid falls back mainly on coal in the evening and is supported by hydro, wind and nuclear energy. Coal-fired power remains the grid's mainstay during non-solar hours, meeting over two-thirds of the total peak demand.

Extreme heat and high electricity demand have also triggered outages in several parts of the country. A power ministry official said there was no shortage of electricity supply at the grid level and that outages in states were primarily due to local distribution failures. Data, however, showed a shortage of 2.6 GW when non-solar-hour demand peaked at 252 GW Thursday evening.

The recent surge in demand was driven by extensive AC use in urban as well as semi-urban areas and smaller towns. The sharp increase in AC penetration is reshaping electricity consumption patterns across India.

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