Power plants suffer from the drought
Business
The power plants in Salzburg are suffering massively from the summer drought. The water input has decreased noticeably, electricity production has dropped significantly.
The Verbund group with its large pumped storage power plants in Kaprun (Pinzgau) and its run-of-river power plants on the Salzach reported a ten percent drop in electricity production, and Salzburg AG even reported a twelve percent drop for July and August. Since the beginning of the year, the minus has been 7.5 percent, confirms the head of all Salzburg AG power plants, Siegfried Müllegger.
“The reason for this is a mixture of different effects. In winter we had relatively little snow in the mountains this year. Therefore, the period of snowmelt was quite short and over early. And now in July and August, of course, the severe drought is having an effect. And both effects together resulted in a 7.5 percent decline in electricity production since the beginning of the year.”
In off-peak times, cheaper electricity fills up power plants
At present, the association and Salzburg AG are filling up their pumped storage power plants with cheap electricity bought in off-peak times. That had already been done in the summer of the century, 2003. At that time, the pumped electricity cost a twentieth of the tariff for which the man then sold the peak electricity from the storage facility.
“We don’t currently have the favorable ratio of one to twenty, but it’s currently between one to five and one to ten. It is important that the electricity is available and can be called up when it is needed,” emphasizes Müllegger.
Experts expect the water intake to continue to fall
Meteorologists and climate researchers assume that the amount of water entering domestic power plants will not increase in the next few years, but rather – on the contrary – will continue to decrease.
Power plants suffer from the drought
The power plants in Salzburg are suffering massively from the summer drought. The water input has decreased noticeably, electricity production has dropped significantly.