India's peak power demand met or the highest supply in a day touched an all-time high of 204.65 GW on Thursday amid a heatwave sweeping through vast swathes of the country.

"During the month of April 2022, peak power demand met has increased by 12.1 percent to 204.653 GW from 182.559 GW during the same period the previous year," a source said.

On Tuesday, the maximum all India power demand met or the highest supply in a day was at the record level of 201.06 GW. The peak power supply had surpassed last year's maximum demand met of 200.53 GW on July 7, 2021. However, the power demand surpassed the supply as there was a deficit of 8.22 GW on Tuesday, according to the official data.

Similarly, there was unmet power demand of 10.29 GW on Wednesday even as the highest supply on that day was 200.65 GW. The power demand is expected to rise further in the coming days as the weather department has predicted that the heatwave sweeping through the country will intensify in the next five days.

The IMD has issued an "orange" alert for Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and parts of Maharashtra and predicted a rise of another two degrees Celsius in the northwest region.

A heatwave spell will persist over northwest and central India during the next five days, and over east India during the next three days, an IMD forecast said on Thursday.

In the month of March this year, the growth in energy demand has been around 8.9 percent as per the ministry's statement. Further, the demand is expected to reach about 215-220 GW in the months of May-June, the ministry had stated.

First Published:Apr 29, 2022 9:04 AM IST