Romania’s economy uses 5% less electricity in Q1

Romania’s economy used 5.1% less electricity in January-March (11.0 TWh) compared to the same period last year.

The households’ consumption increased by 12% to nearly 3.3 TWh and, overall, the end-user power consumption in Romania (public lighting included) contracted by 1.6% to almost 14.5 TWh, according to the National Statistics Institute (INS).

Even so, the domestic production could not cover the entire domestic consumption, and the country imported some 1.8% of the electricity it used over the period.

Some of the production facilities are outdated, but the restrictive regulations passed by the Government in December (emergency ordinance 114/2018), partly lifted earlier this year, created panic in the market where the spot prices spiked on the free market.

The gross domestic electricity production thus dropped by 10.8% year-on-year to nearly 16.0 TWh in January-March, out of which 1.8 TWh was used for balancing the power system itself with the remaining 14.2 TWh delivered to final users or export. The output of country’s hydropower plants (typically accounting for 30% of the whole electricity generation) dropped by 21% year-on-year to less than 3.5 TWh, and the thermal power plants also reduced output by 14.1% year-on-year to just over 7.0 TWh.

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