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Total consumption of domestic electricity and gas (Megawatt Hours) (3806) Metric type
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- Total consumption of domestic electricity and gas (Megawatt Hours)
The sub-national gas and electricity consumption statistics use varying methodology and cover slightly different time periods. The most important difference to bear in mind is that gas data are weather corrected, whilst the electricity data are not. Despite these differences, the combined electricity and gas provide a good indication of overall annual household energy consumption in Great Britain at local authority, MSOA and LSOA level, due to the robustness of the data collection and collation process.
The dataset provides total and average consumption of domestic electricity (from ordinary electricity meters and economy 7 meters), non-domestic electricity and gas, as well as counts of meter points at regional, Local Authority (LA), MSOA and LSOA level. The data are intended to assist local authorities to plan, implement and monitor local energy policy. Economy 7 meters differ from ordinary meters in that they have a separate (cheaper) off-peak rate. Economy 7 meters still measure all household consumption however, meaning a household on an economy 7 tariff will still have only one meter.
GAS:
Data is annualised and weather corrected, the time period is the 1st October 2010 to 30th September 2011. The SOA data are updated annually at the end of March and is available from 2005, LSOA data was produced for the first time in 2008.
Data does not include considerable amount of consumption fed directly to power stations and some very large industrial consumers as this would be disclosive.
The dataset also includes an aggregated total of consumption for unallocated meters. Unallocated meters have insufficient address information, meaning that consumption for these meters is unable to be allocated to a local authority. This can be due to incomplete postcode information, or no postcode information being received at all (usually accounts for less than 1 per cent of consumption).
In some cases a meter can be misallocated to the wrong statistical geography. For example, if an address contains a PO Box number, then the meter would be assigned to the local authority area of the Post Office sorting depot. This is particularly important for interpretation of the data at levels below that of local authority area, as consumption may be allocated to a different area than where it is actually taking place. Misallocation can occur when a meter is allocated to a company’s HQ or PO Box rather than the actual address of the meter. Similarly to unallocated meters, this is caused by incomplete or incorrect address information.
DECC uses the gas industry standard “Annual Quantity” (AQ) cut-off point of 73,200 kWh and classifies all consumers using under that annual consumption as domestic consumers. Unfortunately, this classification incorrectly allocates many small businesses to the domestic sector and, conversely, a small number of larger domestic consumers to the non-domestic sector. This also implies that a small number meters can change sector from year to year.
ELECTRICITY:
The data is annualised and is not weather corrected. The domestic consumption is based on Non-Half Hourly (NHH) meters (these are the standard domestic and economy 7 type tariffs) and is for a time period of 28th January to 27th January. Industrial and commercial consumption data are based on both NHH meters and Half Hourly (HH) meters. Half-hourly (HH) data covers consumption over the calendar year, but is included within the domestic time period. The SOA data are updated annually at the end of March and is available from 2005, LSOA data was produced for the first time in 2008.
Half Hourly consumption (consumption by the larger non-domestic customers) totals, at a local authority level are provided in the Middle Layer Super Output Area (MSOA) level datasets.
The dataset also includes an aggregated total of consumption for unallocated, that is, consumption that was not able to be matched to an area due to incomplete or a lack of postcode information (this usually accounts for less than 1 per cent of consumption).
To complete the data allocation process, the NSPL is used to allocate MPAN postcodes and the associated consumption to statistical local authority level. This implies that any address containing a PO Box number will be assigned to the local authority area of the Post Office sorting depot. This is particularly important for interpretation of the data at levels below that of local authority level, as consumption may be allocated to a different area than where it is actually taking place.
The number of meters does not exactly equal the number of properties. The reasons for this are as follows:
1. An apartment building may have a meter for the building complex (used to power building-wide appliances) in addition to each individual apartment having its own meter.
2. Some households may have a 3-rate meter system. A household with such a system will have one meter which measures all consumption at a peak rate and another meter which measures two other rates of off-peak consumption. This is the case for many households in Scotland, but it is extremely rare to find a similar case in England or Wales.
3. Some meters power street lighting or traffic lights rather than a property (many of these are unallocated).
Domestic meters are reallocated to the industrial and commercial sector if annual consumption is greater than 100,000 kWh. Also re-allocated to the industrial and commercial sector are those consuming over 50,000 kWh with address information indicating non-domestic consumption.
This data does not include Central Volume Allocation (CVA) users; large industrial consumers who receive their electricity through high voltage lines of the transmission system and hence have different arrangements with their electricity suppliers than HH and NHH metered customers. Consumption by CVA users generally account for 1.5 to 2 per cent of electricity sales.
- Modified
- 05 Jan 2023
- Data last updated
- 02 Jul 2022
- Short label
- Total consumption of domestic electricity and gas
- Status
- Discontinued
- Output precision
- 0
- Polarity
- not applicable
- Measure
- Gigawatt Hours
- Dataset
- Sub-national gas consumption data
- Collection
- Sub-national gas consumption data
- Source
- Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy
- is found in the following lists
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