2024-01-05 03:50:23
A test to prepare for a disaster scenario. The residents of Puy-de-Dôme will experiment by the end of March with the “temporary limitation” of electrical power desired by the government to avoid larger power cuts.
This first test aims to break in this new tool in the event of a peak in winter consumption and tension on the electrical system. It will consist of lowering the available power of Linky residential meters to 3kVA (it is generally 6 kVA in homes) in an area covering around 200,000 homes notified in advance, but the electricity will not be cut off there.
Concretely, this experiment “aims to limit over a day and for a maximum of 2 hours the electrical power available to residential customers to a power allowing the preservation of key equipment (lighting, refrigerator, freezer, phone charging, but also installed medical equipment). at home – or 3,000 watts)”, specified the electricity distribution manager Enedis and the ministry.
Equipment not to use
However, it is not recommended for a household to use several energy-consuming equipment simultaneously (oven, washing machine, dryer, dishwasher). The objective is to “measure the impact of temporary power limitation on electricity consumption, its advantages and disadvantages,” Enedis said. Participants in this large-scale test “will be informed by Enedis at least three weeks before the experiment, by post,” indicated the Ministry of Energy Transition.
They will be notified again of the day and the precise time slot five days in advance, by email, SMS or postal mail, according to the ministry, which specifies that they “will receive a bonus of 10 euros for the 2 hours concerned”.
If certain residents refuse to take part in this experiment, they can contact Enedis to be removed from the system, the same source assures. “The scope of the experiment implemented (…) corresponds to the department of Puy-de-Dôme”, according to the decree published at the very end of the year in the Official Journal.
A representative territory
A set of factors determined the choice of this department of Auvergne, according to the Ministry of Energy Transition: “representativeness in the power and types of subscription, in the tariff options, of the effect of the outside temperature on the electricity consumption, the presence of rural and urban areas. The ministry also specifies that local stakeholders have “expressed a favorable opinion to carry out this experiment”.
This test comes a year after a winter of 2022-2023 which loomed over the threat of load shedding, that is to say power cuts suffered, due to the energy crisis caused by the war in Ukraine and the unavailability many reactors in the French nuclear fleet, affected by a phenomenon of stress corrosion.
“We are entering winter in much better conditions than last winter, as the RTE network manager once again reminded us,” indicated the ministry, highlighting the sobriety efforts of businesses, administrations and households (- 8% of electricity consumption compared to 2018-2019 adjusted for climatic hazards over the last twelve months), the deployment of new renewable energy capacities and better nuclear availability.
In the event of conclusive results from the experiment, “this measure could constitute a new safeguard tool to avoid temporary outages” suffered, concluded Enedis.
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