England’s World Cup opener is set to cause power spike

[LONDON] Can brewing a simple cup of tea send ripples through the UK’s power grid?

It might this summer.

As football fans pull on their jerseys for the World Cup, the UK’s grid operator is bracing for a sharp spike in electricity demand when England and Croatia face off in their opening match on Jun 17. One of the biggest surges is expected at half-time, as hundreds of thousands of viewers leave their couches and switch on kettles all at once.

This isn’t a theoretical concern. Power demand could jump by as much as 800 megawatts during the match, according to forecasts from the National Energy System Operator, higher than the 600 megawatt spike during England’s 1966 World Cup win.

The phenomenon will be closely watched by grid experts, who have long relied on major power stations and storage facilities – including the Dinorwig hydroelectric plant in Wales – to quickly boost supply in times of stress.

The system they are managing today looks very different from the one that existed in 1966. Back then, coal accounted for nearly three-quarters of the country’s electricity generation. 

Today, Britain operates without coal-fired power, marking a dramatic shift in its energy mix. Wind and solar now provide more than half of the UK’s electricity, underscoring how far the transition to cleaner energy has progressed over the past six decades.

While this year’s expanded World Cup features 40 additional matches – potentially increasing total electricity demand over the course of the tournament by as much as 60 per cent – the impact of each individual game on the grid is also smaller than it once was.

Thanks to more energy-efficient televisions, electricity consumption associated with watching a match has fallen by around 20 per cent compared with 1998, the last time Scotland qualified for the tournament.

SEE ALSO

World Cup lull could be investors’ chance to score SGX stocks: DBS 

Football frenzy: The Beautiful Game descends on North America

“This year’s World Cup will almost certainly be powered by the cleanest electricity in history,” Craig Dyke, director of system operations at Neso, said in a statement.

Though tea may be a quintessentially British pastime, football-driven power surges are not. Across Europe, major matches have long triggered sharp jumps in electricity demands as fans make snacks and open refrigerators.

In France, electricity consumption jumped by 500 megawatts at half-time during a World Cup quarter-final – equivalent to the power demand of a city the size of Bordeaux, according to grid operator RTE.

The UK’s record football-related power surge came during England’s 1990 World Cup semi-final against West Germany, when demand jumped 2.8 gigawatts. Although this remains a fraction of total consumption, the fact that it happens within seconds puts pressure on the grid.

The instance in 1990 was the equivalent to more than a million kettles being switched on simultaneously. BLOOMBERG