(Bloomberg) -- Kuwait’s Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy on Wednesday temporarily cut off electricity in some parts of the country as power plants struggled with high demand.  

The ministry said in a statement it had to protect the electrical network and took precautionary measures that included programmed cuts of one to two hours. There were various areas across the OPEC-member state that were affected by the controlled outages.

Temperatures rose to 50 degrees Celsius (122F) in the shade on Wednesday, which isn’t unusual for the Gulf state’s summer months. People were urged to ration energy consumption during peak hours to help ease the loads.

Kuwait is part of an interlinked Gulf Cooperation Council electricity grid, and recently said it had bought electricity from neighboring Oman.

©2024 Bloomberg L.P.