Iran’s power grid breaks record amid extreme heat

Iran’s state electricity company Tavanir says demand for power in the country has reached unprecedented levels after an ongoing heatwave pushed temperatures in some provinces above 48 Celsius.

News ID: ۸۵۵۵۷۲

25 July 2024

EghtesadOnline: Tavanir CEO Mostafa Rajabi said on Wednesday that demand for electricity had hit an all-rime record of 78.106 gigawatts (GW) earlier in the day.

Rajabi said the highest demand for electricity recorded last year was in early August when it reached 73.467 GW.

“This is for the sixth time this year that a new record for electricity demand has been recorded,” said the senior official.

“Consumption of electricity is increasing astonishingly which can be due to the presence of a heat dome in the country and the irrational and unruly use of cooling devices,” he said.

Rajabi said, however, that there is enough electricity to handle demand for cooling in Iran although he insisted that customers should lower their use to prevent any shortages.

Reports on Wednesday showed that temperatures had reached 48 Celsius in Ahvaz, a provincial capital of more than a million people located in southwest Iran.

Temperatures were as high as 40 degrees Celsius in Iranian capital Tehran on Wednesday.

Iran’s Energy Minister Ali Akbar Mehrabian said that the country will face five days of excessive heat.

“In some parts of the country, the heat will break records that have not been seen in decades,” said Mehrabian.

The minister said Iran had added an average of 15.2 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) to its annual production of electricity in the past three years to reach a current figure of 332 billion kWh.

He added the total number of customers of the Iranian power grid had reached 40.7 million, up from 37.7 million in August 2021. / Mehr