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Con Edison Sets New Winter Records For Gas, Electric Usage

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- The extreme cold in recent days has led to a new winter one-day record for national gas and electric service use by Con Edison customers.

The low dropped to 4 degrees in Central Park Tuesday, and Con Ed set a new winter day gas usage record of 1,113,254 dekatherms, the utility said in a news release.

New one-day records were also set for electric usage, for a peak of 9,063 megawatts at 6 p.m. and an all-day sendout of 185,572 megawatt hours.

The old winter gas record dated back a mere four days to this past Friday. The gas sendout on Friday was 1,016,292 dekatherms.

For electric demand, the previous all-time winter peak was 8,954 megawatts at 6 p.m. on Jan. 3, 2008. The previous all-time winter sendout record was 182,042 megawatt hours on Jan. 27, 2005.

The big chill of recent days has been caused by a kink in the "polar vortex,'' the strong winds that circulate around the North Pole. The icy air covered about half the country by Tuesday, but it was moving north, returning more normal and warmer weather to most of the country.

This weekend, it was expected to be in the 50s in New York and even higher in places farther south along the Eastern Seaboard.

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