Yesterday at 2:30pm, temperatures of 39.1-degrees Celsius drove electricity demand in Thailand to its highest level ever—26,430 megawatts.
This eclipses the previous record, set on April 26 of last year, which was 26,121 megawatts.
Sutat Patmasiriwat, governor of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), said on Thursday that he expects electricity demand to reach as high as 27,000 megawatts later this summer.
This spike in electricity usage is expected to take place on April 5, a date during which Thailand will be suffering a severe shortage of electricity, thanks to repairs to a natural gas pipeline in Myanmar. Already, malls and manufacturing plants around Bangkok have agreed to curtail their activities in an effort to save power.
The Bangkok Post reports that the Ministry of Energy has asked for Thai citizens to unplug electronics and curtail their power usage on the fifth, in order to help prevent blackouts.
