TN peak power demand touches all time high on April 6

CHENNAI: The state's power demand touched an all time high of 18,252 MW on Thursday (April 6) morning bettering its previous record of 18,053 MW on March 16.

In a tweet, Electricity Minister V Senthilbalaji said the peak power demand touched 18,252 MW on Thursday and it was met without any load shedding.

Even the daily energy consumption also increased sharply to 387.345 million units on Thursday, it just fell short of 0.733 million units to better the all time high energy consumption of 388.077 MUs.

Tangedco was able to meet the all time peak power demand thanks to availability of solar generation of about 40,00 MW, Central generation station and its own thermal stations.

As per the Tamil Nadu State Load Despatch Centre data, the CGS and Tangedco’s own thermal power stations contributed 33 per cent (130 MUs) and 21 per cent (82 MUs) of the Thursday's total energy consumption (387 MUs).

A senior official of Tangedco said that they expect the power demand to touch 18,500 MW - 18,800 MW at the end of the month. "Due to the supply of the three-phase power to the agricultural consumers during the day time, the peak power demand has been going up and the addition of 1.5 lakh agricultural connections in the last two years is also a factor, " the official said.

Besides, the industrial power demand also increased post-Covid. "The IT employees who were working from home have gone back to their offices. So the office air conditioner loads have increased," the official noted.

Timeline of the all-time high peak power demand in Tamil Nadu:

• April 6, 2023 - 18,252 MW

• March 16, 2023 - 18,053 MW

• March 15, 2023 -. 17,749 MW

• March 14, 2023 - 17,705 MW

• March 10, 2023 - 17,647 MW

• March 5, 2023 - 17,584 MW

• April 29, 2022 - 17,563 MW