At the end of the Lunar New Year holiday, the strongest cold wave this winter was predicted, but the increase in power demand is not expected to be large enough to cause concern.
This is because most industries close their factories during the holiday season.
However, it seems that the cold wave will continue even after the Lunar New Year holiday due to the influence of the cold continental high pressure, so tension cannot be relaxed.
The third week of January, which was previously predicted to hit the peak in electricity demand this winter, passed relatively smoothly, and the power authorities eased the burden.
After the cold wave came in December, the temperature remained higher than expected this month, so the actual electricity demand would be far below the forecast until the Lunar New Year holidays.
According to the Korea Power Exchange, the maximum demand for electricity from the 16th to the 20th recorded 81.2 to 86.8 GW (gigawatts).
During this period, the supply reserve is 19.2~23.7GW, and the reserve ratio is 22~29%, maintaining a stable level of electricity supply and demand.
If the normal reserve power falls below 10GW and the supply reserve ratio falls below 10%, it is judged to be in an emergency situation.
Previously, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy predicted the third week of January as the peak power (maximum load) time while announcing the outlook for winter electricity supply and demand.
It was observed that the maximum power demand during this period would be 90.4∼94.0GW (baseline forecast∼upper limit forecast), and reserve capacity would be 15.0∼18.6GW.
However, as a result, the peak power in the third week of January was 7.2~12.8GW lower than the upper limit forecast and 3.6~9.2GW lower than the standard forecast.
Considering that the power generation capacity of one nuclear power plant is about 1GW, it is a significant difference.
As peak power already reached 90.6-94.5 GW in the fourth week of December (19-23), surpassing the peak season forecast, there were concerns that power demand would soar higher in January, when the cold wave is usually stronger. .
During this period, the reserve power fell to 10.6-13.8 GW, and on the 23rd of last month, the maximum power rose to 94.5 GW, the highest ever.
An official from the Korea Power Exchange said, "Statistically, the third week of January is the coldest time, so we expect the peak of electricity demand, but the weather variable is large, so the accuracy is inevitably lower." “It doesn’t seem like it was high,” he said.
In fact, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration, the lowest temperature on weekdays in Seoul in the third week of January was minus 7.7 degrees Celsius and the highest temperature was 4.3 degrees Celsius, lower than the previous week, which was exceptionally warm, but the fourth week of December, when the strongest cold wave came this winter (weekday minimum temperature 13.7 degrees Celsius). , the highest temperature was 2.9 degrees).
In February, demand for power is usually lower than in January.
In February of this year, there is a high probability that the temperature will be similar to the average temperature until the third week, and power supply and demand are expected to remain stable.
The government plans to make the most of nuclear power plants to respond to electricity demand during the winter season.
As Shin Hanul Unit 1 entered full-scale operation from last month, the capacity of nuclear power generation facilities increased from 23.3GW to 24.7GW.