Record demand of 659 MMcf/d last week on San Diego Gas &Electric’s system forced the utility to curtail about 120 MMcf/d ofdeliveries to six interruptible customers, including two powergenerators and four commercial and industrial customers in SouthernCalifornia, SDG&E spokesman Art Larson said. Demand on thesystem Thursday would have exceeded SDG&E’s capacity withoutthe curtailments.

“We’ve had some very high power plant demand here as well ashigh residential demand due to cold weather.” Demand for the24-hour period ending at 7 a.m. Thursday morning was 544 MMcf/dwith the 120 MMcf/d in curtailments. “It’s actually higher than therecord and would have gone beyond our capacity.”

The curtailments are expected to remain in place contingent onthe weather and power plant demand. “We’ve had demand from thethree power plants of about 320 MMcf/d. When we owned those plantsit was about 150 MMcf/d.”

Larson said SDG&E has about 80 interruptible customers andonly six have been interrupted so far in exchange for lower rates.

Rocco Canonica

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