As the day temperature continued to soar making it the hottest day in July in two years, the national Capital on Wednesday witnessed the highest power demand for this year. The mercury hit northwards to settle above the 40 degrees mark pushing the city power demand to 5,634 MW -- the highest so far in 2014. No respite is expected for Delhiites anytime soon as the Met department has predicted similar condition till Friday.
The maximum temperature settled at 40.5 degrees Celsius — five notches above normal— on Wednesday. As Delhiites reeled under hot and humid conditions, their woes were doubled with power cuts being reported mostly from West and East Delhi. West Delhi areas like Paschim Vihar, Tagore Garden, Uttam Nagar, Tilak Nagar and Vikaspuri faced power outages for over two hours. Kondli, Mayur Vihar Phase I, II and III, Karkarduma, Krishna Nagar and Ganesh Nagar in East Delhi also witnessed similar conditions.
The maximum temperature was also recorded at the highest in two years for the month of July. “last year, the mercury only soared as high as 39.2 degrees Celsius while in 2012 it had touched 43.5 degrees Celsius. Usually, July witnesses monsoon and the current upward trend in temperature was mainly due to elusive rains,” said an official from the Met department.
Even nights have been warm of late as mercury almost touched the 30-degree mark. The minimum was recorded at 29.6 degrees Celsius, two notches above normal on Wednesday. The dry patch, however, has brought some relief as it has caused humidity to drop down from the extreme levels of 80 to 90 per cent experienced during last week. “On Wednesday, humidity levels hovered between 64 and 37 per cent,” added the official.
Similar weather conditions are likely to prevail in the city on Thursday as the weatherman has predicted partly cloudy sky while the maximum and minimum are expected to settle around 41 and 30 degrees Celsius respectively. On Tuesday, the day temperature was recorded at 40.3 degrees Celsius, four notches above normal and the minimum settled at 28.6 degrees Celsius, one notch above normal.
The total demand met in Delhi during the last 24 hours from mid-night of July 7 till mid-night of July 8 was 113.690 Million Units out of which 112.785 Million Units were successfully met and 0.896 Million Units were shed due to transmission and distribution constraints and 0.009 Million Units shed to restrict overdrawal. The load-shedding was around 0.80% of the total demand.