Terna: a reduction in electricity consumption equal to 573 million kWh in the 7 month da daylight-saving period

Sunday 30 October, the hands of the clock are moved back one hour; at 03:00 am winter time returns

• This year the daylight-saving period saved the electricity system € 90 million
• Since 2004, a reduction in consumption of 7.8 billion kWh and savings of € 1.2 billion

Rome, 28 October 2016 - After seven months of daylight-saving time, winter time will begin on Sunday 30 October: at 03:00, the hands of the clock are moved back one hour. Daylight saving time will return from 26 March 2017.

According to data collected by Terna, the company that manages the national electricity grid, during the daylight-saving period, which began on 27 March, 2016, thanks to the extra hour of daylight which means a reduction in the need for artificial light, Italy saved an overall total of 573 million kilowatt hours (compared to 552 million kWh in 2015), a value equal to the average annual consumption of electricity of approximately 210 thousand families, for a value of approximately 90 million euro.

As usual, the highest electricity savings were recorded in the months of April and October. This is due to the fact that these two months have 'shorter' days in terms of natural light, compared to other months in the period. Moving the hands of the clock ahead by one hour postpones the use of artificial light while professional activities are still in progress. Instead, during the summer months such as July and August, as the days are already longer compared to April, the 'delay' in turning on the lights occurs in the evening when most working activities have ended, leading to less significant results in terms of electricity savings.

From 2004 to 2016, Italy has saved overall approximately 7.840 billion kilowatt hours, equal to a value of approximately € 1.170 billion.

On the homepage of the Terna website, www.terna.it, the 'load curve' is displayed, representing the real-time consumption of electricity in Italy.