A new record for daily natural gas consumption in the province was set due to the extreme cold temperatures, along with high natural gas consumption from industrial customers and power plants.
SaskEnergy set a 24-hour record beginning Friday, December 16 into Saturday, December 17 delivering 1.33 PetaJoules of natural gas to customers, three per cent higher than the record set earlier this year in January. A PetaJoule is a unit of measurement equivalent to one million GigaJoules (GJ) of natural gas — the average home in Saskatchewan consumes about 105 GJ of natural gas annually.
Record-setting and near record-setting natural gas usage days are happening more frequently with higher customer volumes. This is the fourth consecutive winter in a row that a new record has been established, and seven of the top 10 peak load or near record-setting days for SaskEnergy occurred within the last two weeks. SaskEnergy’s system is designed around this increased growth, ensuring additional capacity so that even on peak record days the system is able to provide more natural gas than required.
SaskEnergy/TransGas employees work throughout the year to inspect, maintain and upgrade Saskatchewan’s natural gas system so that it can operate safely and efficiently regardless of the weather conditions. The system is continuously monitored to manage peak demands such as the winter weather conditions that occurred over the weekend.
SaskEnergy will discontinue cashiering services at its Regina and Saskatoon service centre locations in February due to a continual drop in customer use. No job loss or relocation of employees will occur as a result of these closures.
Popularity of SaskEnergy’s individual cashiering service has declined as a majority of customers make their natural gas payments through their financial institution including on-line and telephone banking.
