Local media reports on Wednesday said that the Iranian Interior Ministry had issued a decree to regional electricity companies ordering them to immediately reduce the supply of power to large manufacturers.
Tejarat News, an economic website, said in a report that cement and steel manufacturers had been required to reduce their consumption of electricity to 10% of the normal demand for 15 days starting May 15.
Iran’s Association of Cement Producers confirmed the report and said that the restrictions would certainly harm output across the industry.
Two steel mills also said that they may be forced to stop production activity in their factories in the next two weeks.
The decision to restrict electricity supplies to industries have come amid rising demand for cooling in the Iranian household sector.
Temperatures have reached record levels in recent days, causing millions of households to turn on their air conditioning systems earlier than expected.
Iran’s Industries minister Mohammad Atabak strongly criticized the decision to cut electricity supplies to major manufacturers, saying that cement, steel and aluminum industries would suffer a major blow from the decision.
Sources from the Iranian Energy Ministry have said that electricity supply in the country will increase significantly in mid-June when power plant repairs are completed.
The Ministry said on Wednesday that electricity consumption in the country had reached a peak of 60.709 gigawatts (GW) on Tuesday, up nearly 6 GW from the same day last year.
Peak demand for electricity in Iran reached a historic record of 85 GW last summer, with authorities saying that the consumption was equal to figures reported in an industrial country like Germany and three times the usage in a populous country like Egypt.
