Power outages: Energy demand hit record high in second week of February

The heat wave that raged in the federal capital and Greater Buenos Aires during this first half of February caused cuts in various AMBA points. Faced with this panorama, some clarifications provided by Argentinathe company that manages the shares of Edesur.

Initially, the company highlighted an advance in the quality of the service which enabled it to reduce the SAIDI: the average downtime per user in a certain period. In particular, in January 2023, the reported figure was 87 minutes, which represents a decrease compared to the figures for this month in 2022 (236) and 2021 (122).

Similarly, Enel Argentina reported that it had also succeeded in reducing the levels of commercial complaints: The amount the company is currently bringing in is about half of what it was getting before the pandemic.

From the high temperatures of the first days of February, on Friday 10 there was a historical record for electricity demand: 4,181 megawatts (MW) was reached at 1:45 p.m. Nine minutes later, the operator of the Greater Buenos Aires high voltage system (SACME), asked Edesur to cut off customers, after detecting that the electricity production for the southern zone was insufficient.

As a result, the service was preventively interrupted to some 180,000 homes, or the equivalent of 250 MW, between 2:00 p.m. and 5:00 p.m. 70% were normalized by 4:00 p.m. establishments due to the heat wave and the situation returned to normal by nightfall.

On the other hand, from Edesur, they point out that the company has been forced to increase field resources by 40% and install more than 20 generators in different areas of the network to minimize assignments.

Another aspect that stands out from the company is that one of the electricity generators in the south zone is South Central Quayan entity that Enel manages with other shareholders, and which has a combined cycle of almost 800 MW (3.2 times what was missing on the day the demand record was reached).

At this plant, the organization is carrying out modernization work that requires an investment of more than $110 million. This will allow the addition of nearly 90 MW of power to the system, greater efficiency and significant environmental improvements.

This project, which started in 2021, began dismantling and reassembling the machines in October 2022 and is in its final phase. Thanks to which, the country will have access to a advanced power generation In the next weeks.

On the other hand, over the last three years, Enel Argentina has invested 665 million dollars, of which 456 million has been allocated to Edesur, despite the tariff delays and contractual breaches observed during this period.

In this sense, on Monday, February 6, the ENRE controller announced that a resolution will be issued with the new values. Once released, financial viability can be assessed so that the business can operate in the quality context that customers require.

Recall that Edesur operated without paying dividends for two decades, with the exception of 13 million dollars in 2009. Against this background, 100% of the company’s income was directed to the operation, and in 2019, Enel has injected 100 million dollars to be able to finance the investment plan. All this, with the aim of offering an ever better service to its users.