Thursday 11 November 2010

Electricity drops for Armistice Day silence

National Grid saw a 620MW reduction in electricity demand at 11am today at the start of the Armistice Day two minute silence.

The fall was the equivalent of a city the size of Bristol switching off all its demand for electricity at once.

This compares to drops in demand of 440MW at the same time in 2004 and 2005, and a fall of 206MW in 2006.

A spokesman for National Grid said: "Although this could never be completely verified, it seems that - as a result of UK military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan in recent years - more people are observing the two minute silence these days than they did even only a few years ago."