Many cities in Turkey face power cuts over the weekend

ISTANBUL

DHA Photo

Many of Turkey’s cities faced power cuts due to efficiency measures against rising natural gas demand at the weekend.

Due to cold weather conditions in the country, the demand for natural gas increased, and to balance the natural gas supply, the power supply was also reduced. There were power cuts in several cities, including Istanbul and Ankara, on Dec. 14. Citizens are unhappy with the move and a number of protests were held in different provinces throughout the country after the cuts.

Energy Minister Taner Yıldız told Anadolu Agency on Dec. 14 that the ministry did not project any power cuts from Dec. 15, adding that they should closely follow winter conditions. He also said Turkey might need a contract for additional 2-3 billion cubic meters of natural gas in the coming years.

There is not any problem regarding the natural gas supply from abroad, but the demand has recently surpassed supply, Yıldız said during budget negotiations in Parliament last week.

“We, as the ministry, are taking measures and we can meet the daily 200 million cubic meters demand for natural gas without problem. There won’t be any problem to supply natural gas to the citizens. Because of extreme weather conditions, there is potential for non-scheduled power cuts for short terms in some cities,” he said.

Yıldız said there could be problems with facilities open to the atmosphere, particularly which had a 100,000 km-long transmission and distribution line.

The minister recalled that pipelines coming from Iran and Azerbaijan had exploded in the past, adding there might be explosions and overloads in the transformers.

The ministry does not foresee a systematical power cut during the winter, he stressed, adding that as long as pipelines from Russia, Azerbaijan and Russia continued to work without problems, there would not be interruption in the natural gas supply.