Scorching Sydney drives demand today into the red zone

Today, the ABC tweets that a new record temperature (45.7 degrees C) has been recorded at Observatory Hill (more here on the ABC website).  As would be expected, these extremes have driven electricity demand into the red zone, as shown in this snapshot from NEM-Watch at 15:05 (NEM time):

A view of the National Electricity Market on 18th January, with demand in NSW at high levels

As clearly shown in this snapshot:

1)  Demand in NSW has reached the extreme levels, but not quite the record level set in that hot week of February 2011;

2)  Demand in QLD is also relatively high; however

3)  Modest demand in VIC, SA and TAS mean that the NEM-wide demand, whilst creeping upwards, has not yet reached the levels achieved yesterday.

It seems like there will be more of this to come through the summer…


PS – the NEM-wide demand peaked today at 31,096MW (at 15:40) whilst the NSW regional demand peaked a little earlier (at 15:15 NEM time) at 13,857MW – which was less than 800MW from the record


About the Author

Paul McArdle
One of three founders of Global-Roam back in 2000, Paul has been CEO of the company since that time. As an author on WattClarity, Paul's focus has been to help make the electricity market more understandable.

3 Comments on "Scorching Sydney drives demand today into the red zone"

  1. Hit 45.8 hottest since 1939 with many other NSW records also falling. But heat across NSW was a bit below par with northern parts cooler. So the state’s overall temp fell well short of record levels!

  2. Correction: meant to say hotter than 1939 when it hit 45.3!

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