Impacts of Regional Climate and Urbanization Changes on Power Consumption in Mexico City Valley

Heat index and heat waves changes due to regional warming and the relationship with the electrical energy infrastructure in Mexico City were analyzed in this work. Furthermore, local effects such as population and urban growth were considered as key factors to drive local climate trends and energy demand. NCEP reanalysis data was used to analyze air temperature and heat index trends across the country of Mexico, Gulf of Mexico and Pacific Ocean. At local scale, weather station distributed around the Mexico City were selected with 20 years of dataset. Heat index, human discomfort index (HDI) and cooling degree were calculated to identify the needed for air conditioning/heating system. Urban configuration was obtained using the urban database and access portal (WUDAPT) and related with population data provided by the National Institute of Geography and Statistics. Power consumption was collected from the National Energy Control Center. In the last 20 years, the northern Mexico valley shows maximum and minimum air temperature increasing trend of 3^oC and 2.4^oC per decade with high statistical significance and related with urban growth and northward/southward wind flow. Moreover, heat waves were intensifying during the 30 years with a rate of 13 heat waves per decade following Jauregui criteria used in Mexico. HDI and cooling degree point to a region with a high energy demand due to regional and local warming in order to keep adequate human comfort levels in buildings. In addition, electric energy consumption is clearly related with demographic changes during January 2000 and July 2016. Although discomfort indexes indicate larger energy demand requirement, the observed energy consumption denotes no relationship between electricity consumption and surface air temperature changes and heat waves intensification. This unexpected result maybe consequence of high electricity cost and population economic constrains. Furthermore, air temperature, heat index changes and heat waves intensification have been driven mostly by land use for urbanization.