Peak Power Demand Hits Government Estimate Of 250 Gigawatt

India's peak power demand touched a high of 250 gigawatt on Thursday, for the second consecutive day of rise in demand, led by intense heatwave conditions in the whole of North and West India, as per data released by the Grid Controller of India.

The peak power demand in Delhi, too, touched a record high of 8,303 megawatt, as the temperature soared to 52.9 degrees Celsius on Wednesday.

State-wise power demand has been rising this summer, in line with the prediction made by the Ministry of Power that the peak this year may touch 250-260 GW.

Some of the major power consuming states—Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Rajasthan—have all seen the demand go up, as compared with 240 GW in September 2023.

Uttar Pradesh topped the list with demand of 28,584 MW, as compared with 25,261 MW in September last year. This was followed by Maharashtra at 28,024 MW, as compared with 27,462 MW; and Tamil Nadu at 19,299 MW, which was up from 15,984 MW.

As compared with May 30, 2023, there is a significant increase in power demand in May this year.

It is expected to surge further in June, with soaring temperatures. Relief will come with the onset of monsoon on the southern coast of India, which can help alleviate heat conditions and even transfer surplus power from South India to North and West.

However, despite increased demand, power shortage was only marginally felt in Jharkhand at 0.35 million units and in Bihar by 0.34 million units. All other states reported zero shortages.

This is more due to pre-emptive measures taken by the government to prevent a repeat of 2021 and 2022, when the country faced extreme power shortage on account of supply chain issues related to coal supply amid shortage of rail rakes and higher cost of imported coal.

This year, the Ministry of Power mandated compulsory running of imported coal-based power plants till Oct. 15. It even asked gas-based power plants to run at full capacity and made it compulsory to blend 10% of imported coal in domestic coal-based power plants.

The ministry also said to postpone maintenance shutdown of power plants to a later date to meet the summer demand.

“Even state governments have taken steps to meet the power shortage issues. Several states are shifting the night peak demand led by agriculture to solar hours. That helps reduce the pressure on night peak demand,” said Rahul Raizada, partner, power and utilities, PwC India.

Night peak is mostly dependent on wind power, and renewable power being intermittent would make sense if it comes as round-the-clock power with hybrid storage benefits, he said.

Till then, it’s beneficial to shift agri demand to solar hours as it constitutes roughly 35-40% of the total demand, Raizada said.