Tamil Nadu: Due to a shortage of cooking gas cylinders, the use of electric stoves has increased significantly in both restaurants and households. Consequently, daily electricity consumption has also risen.
Electricity Board officials stated that lakhs of restaurants across Tamil Nadu operate within the low-voltage sector. Of these, more than 51,000 restaurants are located in the Chennai region alone.
Among these establishments, cooking for five people on a single electric stove consumes 2,000 watts—or 2 kilowatts—of electricity. In contrast, cooking for 800 people requires approximately 1,000 kilowatts—or one megawatt—of power.
Since the use of electric stoves has now extended beyond restaurants to include private households, electricity consumption has seen a slight uptick over the past few days. Accordingly, Tamil Nadu’s daily power consumption last week hovered between 18,000 MW and 19,000 MW.
However, over the last two days, this consumption has risen from 19,200 MW to 19,300 MW. In the coming days, this figure could potentially reach 19,500 MW. Nevertheless, officials added that since the Electricity Board possesses sufficient power reserves to meet this demand, there is no likelihood of any electricity shortage occurring.
