Consumption of electric power decreases 3% in February due to above-normal temperatures

The consumption of electric power decreased by 3% in February, when compared with the corresponding period of the previous year, penalized by the temperatures, which were higher than usual for the season, unlike what happened in the same month of the previous year. There is also a decrease of 1.2%, when correcting for the effects of temperature and number of working days. 
 
Rainfall remained below average values, with a hydropower capability index of 0.57 (historical average of 1). In wind generation, despite the new all-time highs recorded in daily and peak production on 1 February, globally, the conditions were also significantly negative, with an index of 0.72 (historical average of 1). This number was, for February, the lowest in REN's records (since 2001). This month, renewable production fuelled 48% of domestic consumption, non-renewable production accounted for 36%, while the remaining 17% were supplied with imported energy.
 
The hydropower capability index for the first two months of the year stands at 0.49 (historical average of 1), whereas the wind-power capability index is 0.91 (historical average of 1). Given these negative conditions, renewable production supplied 50% of consumption, broken down into 26% for wind power, 18% for hydropower, 5% for biomass and 1.7% for photovoltaics.  Non-renewable production supplied 41% of consumption, with natural gas accounting for 22% and coal for 18%. Imports, which have been especially high this year, supplied around 10% of the consumption.
 
In the natural gas market, domestic consumption recorded a year-on-year negative variation of 11.1% due to the strong decline of around 40% recorded in the electricity market segment. In the conventional segment, there was a rise of 1.9% this month, which wasn't even more significant due to the above-normal temperatures that were felt.  In the first two months of the year, the consumption of natural gas recorded a drop of 9%, stemming from a 36% decline in the electricity market and from a 5.2% increase in the conventional market.