High temperatures cause household electricity use to hit new record in 2018

South Korea's household electricity use hit an all-time high in 2018 as the country experienced record high temperatures that caused people to turn on their air conditioners for longer periods of time, official data showed Sunday.

Last year the country witnessed the hottest summer in 111 years that pushed up electricity used by homes to 72,895 gigawatt hours (GWh), up 6.3 percent from 68,544 GWh tallied in the previous year, the Electric Power Statistics Information System (EPSIS) released by the Korea Power Exchange said.

The number is the highest tallied since Seoul started compiling such records in 1993.

The exchange added that last year was the first time that household power usage exceeded the 70,000 GWh mark.

"The scorching heat caused people to depend more on their air conditioners to stay cool, with the decision by the government to ease progressive electricity tariff rates in July and August, stimulating demand," a market watcher said. The government's move lowered the electricity bill of households.

On Aug. 1, the mercury rose to 39.6 degrees C, with the number of days categorized as being very hot reaching 31.4 in total, three times the annual average of 9.8 days.

For the country as a whole, power consumption rose 3.6 percent on-year to 526,149 GWh.

EPSIS showed industrial power use rose 2.5 percent on-year to 292,999 GWh, while general electricity use covering shops, offices and schools rose 5.1 percent to 116,934 GWh.

With household electricity use outpacing other sectors, power used by homes made up 13.9 percent of the total, up 0.4 percentage point from 13.5 percent in 2017. In contrast, the percentage of industrial power backtracked from 56.3 percent to 55.7 percent in the same period.

The power exchange said the proportion of electricity used by air conditioners that first exceeded 20 percent of total supply in 2004 hit 24.5 percent in 2015, before rising to 28.3 percent in 2017. It estimated that while exact numbers are yet to be compiled for 2018, it could have topped the previous year's number.

Last year electricity use comes as the Paris-based International Energy Agency said that in 2016, South Korea had the third highest average power per capita among members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Iceland led the pact with the United States coming in second.

Figures for Iceland stood at 53,913 kilowatt hours (kWh), with the U.S. and South Korea standing at 12,825 kWh and 10,618 kWh, respectively.

On a national level, Asia's fourth-largest economy used 534 terawatt hours (TWh), placing it seventh in the world. The country as a whole used more power than larger economies like Germany and France. (Yonhap)