Electricity consumption by all categories of consumers in Ukraine rose by 6.9% YoY in January-September, to 92.2 billion kWh, the Ukrainian power company Ukrenergo reported.
“The main reasons are the lack of strict quarantine measures in 2021 to counter the spread of COVID-19. As a result, consumption increased in all months, but the largest increase was recorded in March and April – by 11.6% and 12.4%, respectively,” the report reads.
In addition, the weather in July 2021 was hotter than in July 2020, which led to a 7.2% increase in consumption.
According to the report, in the first nine months of 2021 all groups of consumers increased their consumption, except for agricultural enterprises (-5.9%). At the same time, the largest increase in consumption was recorded in groups of non-industrial consumers (small and medium businesses) – by 18.1%, construction – by 15%, and transport – by 9.4%. At the same time, electricity consumption by households grew by 5.6% and by industrial enterprises by 6.7%.
Among industries, the largest amount of electricity was consumed by construction materials producers (+17.1%) and machine builders (+14.1%). Ukrenergo also noted a significant increase in electricity consumption by the metallurgical and chemical and petrochemical industries (+6.5% and +7.1%, respectively).
In the structure of electricity consumption in January-September compared to the same period in 2020, there was a significant decrease in the share of the population (from 30.9% to 30.5%) and a simultaneous increase in the group of non-industrial consumers (from 6.1% to 6.7%), which Ukrenergo explained by the lack of quarantine restrictions this year.
In addition, farmers reduced their share from 3.2% to 2.9%. Other consumer groups did not change their share (fluctuations within 0.2%). (Ukrinform/Business World Magazine)