Tennessee Valley residents set a single-day record for electricity use while keeping warm during this week’s arctic cold wave, the Tennessee Valley Authority said Wednesday.

Homes and businesses across TVA’s seven-state region used 703 gigawatt-hours of electricity on Tuesday, the most ever for a 24-hour, one-day period. TVA’s previous record was 701 gigawatt-hours on Jan. 8, 2010.

This came one day after TVA had its fourth highest “energy day” ever on Monday with 678 gigawatt-hours.

The Valley’s average temperature Tuesday never got above 21 degrees, and the average was just 4 degrees that morning when TVA’s power system experienced its second highest winter peak power demand in the public utility’s history. [Read more…]