National Grid Meets Second-Highest Ever Natural Gas Demand

WALTHAM, MA (01/25/2011)(readMedia)-- Everyone knows by now that it was cold on Sunday and Monday. It was so cold that National Grid's natural gas customers came close to breaking the all-time record for natural gas consumption. Between 10 am Sunday January, 23 and 10 am on the following day National Grid delivered 4.55 billion cubic feet of natural gas to its 3.4 million customers in New England and New York. The total fell just short of the record of 4.57 billion feet the company delivered to customers on January 15, 2004.

"Being able to meet our customers' needs is always gratifying to us," said Nick Stavropoulos, executive vice president of U.S. Gas Distribution for National Grid. "Doing it safely and reliably under brutal weather conditions like those we experienced into Monday makes it even more so."

A regional breakdown of throughput of natural gas during the 24-hour period shows that the New York City area set an all-time record of 1.24 billion cubic feet. Over the same period, the Long Island region used 0.83 billion cubic feet. In National Grid's upstate New York natural gas distribution area customers used 1.04 billion cubic feet. Gas usage in New England represented the region's sixteenth highest throughput.

The demand was brought on by the frigid weather that moved into the area over the first part of the weekend and is predicted to leave over the next 24 hours. Official low temperatures of minus seven Fahrenheit were recorded in Syracuse and Albany, New York. The temperature hit minus two in Boston and six above zero in the New York City and Long Island area.

National Grid is an international energy delivery company. In the U.S., National Grid delivers electricity to approximately 3.3 million customers in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Rhode Island, and manages the electricity network on Long Island under an agreement with the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA). It is the largest distributor of natural gas in the northeastern U.S., serving approximately 3.4 million customers in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Rhode Island. National Grid also owns over 4,000 megawatts of contracted electricity generation that provides power to over one million LIPA customers.

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