Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Monday, Jul 15, 2002
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Monday, Jul 15, 2002 |
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Industry & Economy
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Power Eastern region facing acute power crisis Our Bureau
KOLKATA, July 14 THE eastern region is hovering around a grid collapse with the National Thermal Power Corporation shutting down three of its 500 MW units in the region. This means a reduction of 1500 MW from the NTPC system, which supplies 3440 MW power to this region through its plants at Farkka in West Bengal, Talcher in Orissa and Kahalgaon in Bihar. The eastern region, which narrowly escaped a grid failure on Friday night primarily with the aid of the `under-frequency relays systems' in West Bengal, has curtailed by 100 MW its power exports to the southern region, sources at the Eastern Region Electricity Board said. The relays systems, which were installed in West Bengal after the grid collapse two years ago, allows for automatic shutdown of power supplies when the frequency drops below a stipulated level. All the five units of the Farakka Super Thermal Power Plant of NTPC in North Bengal had to be shut down on Friday owing to a transformer fault, sources said. While the plant was revived on Saturday, two of its 500 MW units developed tube leaks and had to be shut down, sources said, adding that the under-frequency relays system of the West Bengal State Electricity Board and Damodar Valley Corporation helped avert a blackout in the region by resorting to load-shedding. The region now faces a peak hour (between 6 and 10:30 pm) shortage of nearly 1000 MW. Matters are likely to get a little critical since the NTPC has begun its programme to regulate power supplies to Bihar in order to recover Rs 2,400 crore dues from the State. However, although Bihar has been asked by the regional grid not to draw more than 270 MW, there is little hope that it would abide by the dictum. Sources said that on Friday when at one time the region faced a 1500 MW shortage, Bihar drew around 800 MW. EREB's constituents in West Bengal were peeved that time and again (once this sort of a shortage due to NTPC's regulation on Orissa) they were being made to suffer due to the regulation programme of the central power utility. West Bengal, which has an allocation of 670 MW from NTPC power, was having to make do with supplies of only 310 MW in this situation, Dr G.D. Gautama, WBSEB Chairman, said.
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