Exelon’s two utility subsidiaries, Commonwealth Edison in Chicago and Philadelphia-based PECO, reported record winter peak power demand last Monday because of extremely cold temperatures and customer growth, and KeySpan said its New York and Long Island utility operations both set new gas demand records when it averaged about 14 degrees in the KeySpan service territory.

Demand rose to 1.1 Bcf/d on KeySpan New York’s system and 751,000 Dth/d on KeySpan Long Island, excluding demand from power generation, said Melissa Mairn, manager of supply planning for KeySpan.

“KeySpan New England also had some very healthy sendouts through this period and had some very cold weather, but didn’t set any records,” she said. “In fact, Jan. 26 was the highest demand day for them, but it was only the ninth coldest they’ve seen. They had sendouts over 1 Bcf/d but nothing that broke their previous record of 1.4 Bcf/d of a couple years ago.” She said the prior records for KeySpan New York and KeySpan Long Island were both set on Jan. 18, 2005 at 1.09 Bcf/d and 750,000 Dth/d, respectively.

“With the warm weather earlier this winter we were well prepared for this cold,” said KeySpan’s Lukas. “We really didn’t have any problems this time around. What we are going to need is more firm transportation capacity and we will have that for next winter. Millennium is coming online and we have the the Long Beach Line (Williams/Transco) coming on Long Island — that’s an expansion of an existing line. We also have our merger [with National Grid, which owns Niagara Mohawk and Rhode Island Gas]. It’s more diversity of supply, better reliability.”

More transportation capacity probably would limit future price spikes, Lukas indicated. However, he said KeySpan was able to avoid paying $60/MMBtu for gas on Transco earlier in the week when prices spiked to that level. Lukas said KeySpan has made few if any spot purchases this month. “Everything we bought was at first-of-the month prices.”

The extreme cold last week also sent demand to record levels on Tuesday in Washington Gas Light’s service territory, and the company said some of its equipment in Potomac, MD, failed under the stress of high usage, leaving about 660 customers without gas for about 24 hours.

“It was a weather-related event. We had record breaking demand, and it just got to a point where this little isolated section of our system lost service,” said Washington Gas Light spokeswoman Jan Davis. “We had plenty of gas, but a regulator [failed]. I don’t think it was a freeze-off situation, just incredible demand on the regulator.”

Washington Gas restored service in the affected area at 3:10 a.m. last Wednesday and visited most customers in the area to restore service to their homes by relighting their furnace pilot lights. As of 7 a.m. that day, about 399 of the 660 customers had their natural gas service restored.

Davis said the company was still trying to determine how much demand it served Tuesday, but she said it was a record. Its previous record of 1.548 Bcf was set on Jan. 23, 2005, as sub-freezing temperatures gripped the Washington, DC metropolitan region. The company serves about one million customers in Washington, DC, Virginia and Maryland.

Demand for electricity in ComEd’s territory in Illinois reached a winter record of 16,207 MW between 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Monday when temperatures hit a low of minus nine degrees and a high of six degrees. The new mark eclipses the previous winter peak of 16,081 MW reached Dec. 19, 2005. The utility’s all-time peak demand of 23,613 MW was recorded on Aug. 1, 2006. In addition to the cold temperatures, ComEd noted that it has experienced steady customer growth in its territory, which includes 5.2 million customers.

PECO, which serves 1.6 million power customers, also set a new winter peak of 6,852 MW on Monday when temperatures in Philadelphia hit a low of 10 degrees and a high of 19. PECO also said that gas demand on its system Monday was the fifth highest on record at 678 MMcf. Gas usage was the highest since December 2004 and was up about 16% from levels on Sunday. PECO’s all-time record for gas demand was set on Jan. 17, 2000 when a sustained cold snap sent usage up to 718.4 MMcf.

Slightly warmer temperatures reduced power demand Tuesday to 15,800 MW in ComEd’s territory and to 6,692 MW in PECO’s territory, and similar demand numbers were expected through the rest of the week. Temperatures were expected to remain well below averages for this time of year.

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