Kyrgyzstan experienced record electricity consumption on December 11-12, 2024, according to the Ministry of Energy.
The ministry acknowledges that due to the onset of winter and a drop in air temperature, the population began to consume more electricity, The Caspian Post reports, citing Kyrgyz media.
As of December 12, at least 3,612 megawatts of electricity were consumed, daily electricity consumption reached 78,931 million kilowatt-hours. Such an indicator has never been registered in the history of Kyrgyzstan.
The last record electricity consumption was recorded on December 14, 2023. Then the consuming capacity of electricity was 3,401 megawatts, and daily consumption reached 73.37 million kilowatt-hours. However, then the air temperature was −8 ... −20 degrees Celsius, and on December 11-12, 2024, the air temperature was only −5 ... −14 degrees, energy sector specialists told.
Currently, in areas with excessive use of electricity, the equipment in the electrical network is overloaded. In this case, power engineers need 1-2 hours before transferring consumers" electricity to another line (feeder). A temporary power outage follows. If power engineers do not take such measures, expensive power equipment may fail.
For example, the price of a 220-kilowatt transformer with a capacity of 250 megawatts is $1,518 million. The manufacturing and delivery period will be 150 calendar days. Its reinstallation will take about 1-1.5 months. This requires too much effort and money.
A shortage of electrical energy and capacity is also observed in other energy systems in Central Asia. Therefore, despite the fact that energy experts urge the population to save electricity, the demand for electricity is high and reaches a record level.
Hydrogenerators of Electric Stations JSC operate at the highest level of their technical capabilities with maximum output. The Toktogul hydropower station, after the reconstruction and commissioning of the hydroelectric unit No. 1, operated at a maximum capacity of 1,260 megawatts, and daily output reached 27.528 million kilowatt-hours.
The amount of water flowing out of the Toktogul reservoir is increasing daily, now its flow through the station"s hydroelectric units is 932 cubic meters per second.
For example, if we entered the winter heating season of 2023 with a volume of 11.744 billion cubic meters of water, then this year, as a result of the optimal work of power engineers on providing water and import of electricity from outside, they managed to accumulate up to 13.257 billion cubic meters of water by the winter heating season of 2024.
Compared to last year, there are more than 1.5 billion cubic meters of water (reserve). Due to the sharp increase in electricity consumption in the country, more than 1 billion cubic meters of water have been used to date, and this gap is decreasing every day.
If electricity consumption continues at this rate, the volume of water may sharply decrease to 6 billion cubic meters before the end of the winter heating season. This means that by April 1, 2025, the volume of water in the reservoir will be 6.5-6.2 billion cubic meters, which may lead to a critical level (dead storage).
Power industry specialists urge Kyrgyzstanis to save electricity in the morning and evening.
