Coverage of electricity demand was extremely tight on Wednesday due to simultaneous faults at EAC generating units at the Dhekelia and Vasilikos power stations, with the prospect of power cuts remaining likely until late in the afternoon. Despite intensive efforts by the Electricity Authority of Cyprus (EAC) to bring an additional unit at Dhekelia back into service, this ultimately proved impossible.
In the end, the system was unable to cope with demand and, shortly before 7pm on Wednesday, the Transmission System Operator Cyprus (TSOC) activated a rolling power cut plan after available electricity supplies proved insufficient to meet demand across government-controlled areas of Cyprus.
Under the plan, outages were imposed on groups of consumers islandwide for periods of approximately 18 to 20 minutes, with the cuts expected to end at around 9.30pm.
The TSOC warned on Wednesday of a potential inability to meet demand, noting that high temperatures are expected to continue on Thursday, while the heatwave is forecast to ease from Friday, when temperatures are expected to fall below 40C.
Peak demand for Thursday is estimated at 1,350MW at midday and 1,100MW in the evening, while available generation capacity is expected to remain at similar levels to Wednesday, TSOC said.
The operator appealed to the public to make prudent use of electrical appliances in order to save electricity, particularly during the evening peak period from 6pm to 10pm.
"TSOC will manage the situation with its primary priority being the safe operation of Cyprus' electricity system," the statement said.
System operating at its limits
Haris Zavallis, assistant director of TSOC's National Energy Control Centre, told CNA on Wednesday that authorities could not guarantee that evening demand would be fully covered.
"We cannot say with certainty that we will cover evening demand, because the system is stressed and operating at its limits," he said.
Zavallis explained that TSOC maintains reserve capacity each day to respond to sudden failures at major generating units.
"If a major generating unit suffers a fault, the system must be able to replace it. For that reason, when consumers are disconnected, these fast-start units are synchronised within 12 to 15 minutes and the load is restored," he said.
"Unfortunately, all of those units will already be running, which means reserves will remain limited, even if the Dhekelia unit is returned to service."
At the same time, he assured the public that TSOC would utilise every available megawatt of generation to avoid further power cuts.
"We will exhaust every available means to avoid outages, without making any compromise whatsoever on the safety and reliability of the electricity system," he said.
Zavallis called on consumers to contribute to the effort by limiting electricity consumption, particularly between 6pm and 8pm, both Thursday and Friday.
He also expressed optimism that the situation would improve over the weekend as temperatures begin to fall.
From next week, a generating unit at Vasilikos could return to service, increasing available generating capacity by 105MW.
