As temperature of the national Capital touched to 43 degree, Delhi’s peak power load touched the seasons’ highest of 6,612 megawatt on Monday. According to estimates, almost around 50 per cent of Delhi’s power demand in summers’ increases because of the cooling load (ACs, coolers and fans), a BSES official said and this is primarily the main factor behind the increase in Delhi’s power load. 

In order to reduce power consumption, the power distribution company BSES has launched several measures including an innovative air conditioner replacement scheme. Under the scheme, consumers in South, West, East and Central Delhi can replace their old energy guzzling ACs with energy efficient 5-star rated ACs (both windows and split) from leading AC manufacturers at up to over 50 per cent discount, the official said, adding that under the scheme, 10,000 air-conditioners (each in BRPL and BYPL) of leading brands are on offer on a first cum first serve basis.

 BRPL, BYPL and Tata power- DDL successfully met the peak power demand of 2829, 1524 and 1886 MW in their respective areas. “The expected peak power demand of 7400 MW this year is an increase of over 250 per cent over the peak power demand of 2879 MW in 2002.

It is interesting to note that Delhi’s peak power demand is substantially more than that of other cities. It is not only more than the power demand of Mumbai and Chennai put together but also thrice than that of Kolkata,” the BSES official said.

The official informed that arrangements have been firmed up by BSES discoms to source adequate electricity to meet the power demand of over 42 lakhs consumers. These arrangements include long term power purchase agreement (PPA) and banking arrangements with other states including Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Meghalaya, Manipur and Sikkim, he said, adding that in case of unforeseen contingencies because of low generation and outages in power plants, the discoms will purchase short-term power from the exchange.

Delhi’s peak power demand during the summers of 2019 may clock 7400 MW. Last summers, they breached the 7000 MW for the first time - peaking at 7016 MW. Peak power demand in

BRPL’ area of South and West Delhi, which had reached 3081 MW during the summers of 2018, is expected to touch around 3200 MW this year. In BYPL’ area of East and Central Delhi, the peak power demand which had reached 1561 MW last year is expected to touch around 1640 MW.