Delhi's power demand likely to cross an all-time high this summer, details here

New Delhi: Amid the all-time high temperatures in the national capital, Delhi`s power demand continues a northwards climb, creating new records. Delhi is facing an acute shortage of power and outages due to which various necessary services are getting affected. On Thursday, the city`s peak power demand not only clocked the season`s highest at 7070 MW, but also the highest ever in the month of May, PTI reported. BSES on Friday attributed cooling load as the reason behind an increase in the power demand. According to the Discom`s estimates, almost around 50 per cent of Delhi`s power demand in summers is because of the cooling load (ACs + Coolers + Fans). The rain had a direct bearing on the cooling load.

"Delhi’s power demand unit breached the 7,000 mark for the first time in 2018 (July 10), when it clocked 7016 MW. The following year (2019), it clocked 7409 MW (July 2), the highest ever recorded in the history of Delhi. In 2020, it did not cross the 7,000 MW and peaked at 6314 MW. In 2021 (July 2), the city`s peak power demand clocked 7323 MW. This year, the expected peak power demand of around 8200 MW is an increase of around 285 per cent over the peak power demand of 2879 MW in 2002," they said.

As per Discom wise peak power demand on Friday night, is only the fourth in Delhi`s history, when the national capital`s peak power demand has breached the 7000 MW.

Further, it was informed that Delhi`s peak power demand has increased by 10 per cent since May 1, and since April 1, Delhi`s peak power demand has increased by over 58 per cent. This is the 15th time in 20 days of May that the national capital`s peak power demand has crossed 6000 MW.

Delhi weather

After spells of intense heatwaves, Delhi experienced a slight relief on Friday after parts of NCR received heavy rainfall making the overall temperature cooler.

A partly cloudy sky, a drizzle and hail brought temporary relief to some parts of the city in the evening. A cyclonic circulation persisting over Punjab and Haryana will lead to intermittent thundershowers on Saturday (May 21), weather forecasters said.

(With PTI inputs)