New Zealand’s hydro-electric storage peaked at 4063 GWh during January 2010 before slowly declining.
At the beginning of January 2010, New Zealand’s hyrdo-electric reserves stood at 3503 GWh (GigaWatt hours), 119% of average for the time of the year. The average levels are determined over an 80-year period. Lake levels improved during the early part of the month, peaking at 4063 GWh on January 11th. Levels then slowly declined, dropping to 3638 GWh, 115% of average, by month’s end.
Daily inflows were above average on 12 days, but from January 14th were consistently below average for the time of year. However, when averaged over a 30-day period, inflows were above average throughout the month.
No southbound transfers took place via the Cook Strait cables during January 2010.
Comparing weekday for weekday, demand was higher than that recorded during January last year on 29 days. Average daily load for January 2010 was 96.2 GWh compared with January last year’s average of 92.6 GWh. Peak load occurred on the 20th of January 2010 when 107.6 GWh was drawn. Peak load during January 2009 was 103.7 GWh.
[ Compiled from data supplied by M-Co. ]