The heat wave seems to have toppled at least one power demand record. A spokeswoman for the Independent System Operator that runs the New England grid – ISO New England – said preliminary results for Saturday showed a peak demand in the region of 24,653 megawatts. If that holds, it will set a new record for weekend power demand.

It was also more power than ISO New England had predicted it would need. Weekend power demand is typically lower than weekday.

ISO New England also reported that its preliminary data for the weekday portion of the heat wave showed peak demand came on Friday at 27,377 megawatts. If that holds it will be the fourth highest on record. The highest was 28,130, coming during a heat wave on Aug. 2, 2006.

Jan Ellen is CT Mirror's regular freelance Environment and Energy Reporter. As a freelance reporter, her stories have also appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Yale Climate Connections, and elsewhere. She is a former editor at The Hartford Courant, where she handled national politics including coverage of the controversial 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. She was an editor at the Gazette in Colorado Springs and spent more than 20 years as a TV and radio producer at CBS News and CNN in New York and in the Boston broadcast market. In 2013 she was the recipient of a Knight Journalism Fellowship at MIT on energy and climate. She graduated from the University of Michigan and attended Boston University’s graduate film program.

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