As lockdown bites, electricity usage falls 9.2% in March

India’s electricity use fell 9.2 per cent in March, provisional government data showed on Wednesday, as consumption dropped for the first time in three months due to a nationwide lockdown to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Consumers used 100.2 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) in March, compared with 110.33 billion units a year earlier, an analysis of load despatch data by state-run Power System Operation Corp Ltd (POSOCO) showed.

That was India’s fastest pace of decline in consumption since October when power use fell at its steepest in over 12 years due to a broad economic slowdown.

As the scare of the spread of the coronavirus mounted, Prime Minister Narendra Modi first imposed a partial lockdown on March 22, following which states progressively increased restrictions culminating in a national three-week shutdown starting March 25.