The easing of lockdown measures has increased energy demand but daily transmission volumes in the UK power grid was still around 10% below the 2019-average in the first 22 days of June.
“Ever since the record-breaking spring Bank Holiday, when transmission system power demand troughed at a 15-year low of 14.5 GW in a single settlement period, demand has slowly resurged. But it has yet to come close to reaching the 0.7 TWh daily demand seen at the end of March 2020,” said Cornwall Insight analyst, Sam Nicholls.
Poor economic forecasts keep a lid on energy demand
The uptick in demand can, at least in part, be attributed to the easing of lockdown restrictions. Since the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on May 10 encouraged employees to go back to work, the gap between 2020 daily Transmission System demand and the five-year average has narrowed from 0.14 TWh before, to 0.11 TWh after the announcement.
The opening of non-essential retail stores from 15 June led to a further boost in UK energy demand. “However, power demand is unlikely to reach the same levels as last year as a result of poor economic forecasts for the coming months, with many lockdown restrictions remaining,” Nicholls commented.