Do you put the kettle on? England semi-final shows fans’ electricity habits during game

Following England’s historic win against Denmark last night, we looked at some electricity demand data which has shown the impact of England’s first major semi-final win in 55 years on our network.

The data shows that as 25.7 million viewers across the country tuned in to watch the game, overall electricity demand across the WPD network on the evening of 7 July was lower than would be expected for a Wednesday. The data chart below clearly shows a surge in demand following the half time whistle as households went to pop the kettle on following a thrilling first half. Demand at half time peaked at 8,181MW.

There was a similar pattern following the end of 90 minutes. Just before the nail-biting 30 minutes of extra time which saw Harry Kane take England into the final, network demand peaked at 7,888MW as households made one last cup of tea before the end of the game. Across the network, this was the largest spike in electricity usage during the match. There was an increase in demand of 220MW, enough to power the boiling of 2.2 million kettles.

Commenting on the figures, WPD’s Data and Digitalisation Manager Jon Berry said: “Yesterday's game had all our pulses racing and our data shows that England’s win made a clear impact on our network. We expect a similar effect on demand on Sunday with the increased demand for cups of tea and drinks in households and pubs across the WPD network on Sunday evening. Let’s hope for an electric game against Italy and fingers crossed that Southgate’s men bring it home!”

The data, which shows a comparison between the demand on the network for last night’s game and last Wednesday can be found here.