Electricity grid stretched to brink as sweltering Israelis turn to air conditioners for relief
Power outages may occur in coming days if electricity use exceeds supply; public asked to reduce consumption in late afternoon
Electricity consumption in Israel hit a yearly record on Tuesday, as power guzzlers came within a few hundred megawatts of crashing the grid.
at 2:55 p.m. Tuesday, consumption across the country hit 11,370 megawatts, 200 megawatts shy of the all time record, set in August of 2010. The Israel Electric Corporation is able to produce 11,740 megawatts.
The IEC asked customers again to minimize use of electrical appliances in the morning, late afternoon and evening hours, specifically from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m..
With temperatures expected to continue rising over the next two days, air conditioners should be set to 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit) the report noted.
Israelis have been warned of late that if electricity demand exceeds supply, the IEC may employ rolling blackouts to shut off power in some areas for up to an hour at a time in order to keep the rest of the country powered.
Last week the Fire and Rescue Services advised the nation to check that backup generators were ready for operation and that alarms in elevators were working properly.
Israel’s already straining power supplies took a further blow with the halting of natural gas supplies from Egypt earlier this year.
In June, former director general of the Israel Electric Corporation Amos Lasker called for the country to turn to nuclear power as an energy source, saying that relying on natural gas supplies was irresponsible.
The Times of Israel Community.