Cold wave in France: no power cut, consumption a little lower than expected, according to RTE

by time news

France avoided the breakdown. Electricity consumption, given the cold wave, was a little lower than expected early Monday morning, making it possible to avoid power cuts, the manager of the lines told AFP. high and very high voltage electricity RTE.

“So far, we have enough production to meet consumption (…) a little lower than forecast,” said the manager of the Electricity Transmission Network (RTE) shortly after 9:00 a.m.

National consumption seemed to have peaked: shortly after 9.15 a.m., it was 71.346 MW, lower than the peak of 73.000 MW initially expected for 9 a.m., according to RTE’s Eco2Mix site, which tracks consumption data in real time. It then dropped a little, to 71.232 MW, shortly after 9:30 a.m.

The impact of eco-gestures still unknown

“Consumption is a little below our forecasts, but it is still too early to know what the impact of eco-gestures is,” said RTE.

RTE had activated the national Ecowatt “orange” signal (which can go as far as red) due to the drop in temperatures, which was to increase electricity consumption, and called on households and businesses to reduce their consumption on Monday morning.

In a tweet broadcast on Sunday, the Carrefour distribution chain had, for example, announced that it would reduce its electricity consumption on Monday morning, through the voice of its general manager Rami Baitiéh.

RTE forecast national consumption of up to 73,000 MW around 09:00. National production should be only 65,000 MW at the same time, but France should be able to import up to 11,000 MW to pass this milestone, according to RTE, which estimated that the situation could however be “tense”.

The French electricity system is under tension this winter due to numerous shutdowns of nuclear reactors, for maintenance and verification of corrosion problems. Currently, 27 nuclear reactors are unavailable out of 56.

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