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Inadequacy of transmission lines to evacuate power from the western region has aggravated Kerala's power crisis.
“Power is available in the western region. But evacuation is a problem in the absence of transmission lines,” a senior KSEB official told Business Line .
Non-completion of the Mysore –Areekode (Kozhikode) transmission line has become a major hurdle. Construction of the line in Kerala section is complete but the portion in Karnataka has not been completed because of objection by coffee planters who, surprisingly do not possess any title deeds, in the Coorg region, he said.
Permission, therefore, from the government is pending for long.
The Power Grid Corporation which is constructing the line is moving at a slow pace while the State Government is also not making any serious efforts to solve this problem, the official alleged.
Kudankulam
A similar situation is prevailing in the case of evacuation of power from the Kudankulam nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu, which will go on stream any time now. The construction of Kochi- Edamon transmission line could not be started due to opposition by rubber growers mainly in Pathanamthitta and Kottayam districts, he said.
However, some progress has been made in the stretch in Ernakulam district, he said. The Tirunelveli–Edamon stretch has almost been completed, he said.
Power is available from private producers at competitive rates but lack of transmission lines is the bottleneck, he said.
Water levels
Inadequate monsoon rains have left storage levels in the hydroelectric projects in the State this year at nearly 50 per cent of the normal levels. The total storage in the reservoirs from June 1 to November 28 was enough to generate 3,371.6 million units (mus) as against 6,522 mus in the same period last year.
With the current storage levels, only 1,940 mus could be generated and if it is uniformly divided at 9 mus a day, it may last till May 31, sources said.
As a result, power generation from the hydel projects had to be cut down to around 9 million units daily from around 20 mus daily. The daily average demand, at present, is 56–57 mus.
From the Central grid, 23 mus are drawn while 14 mus are bought from Gujarat, Odisha etc at an average cost of Rs 7 a unit. About 7–8 mus are purchased from the Kayamkulam thermal plant at Rs 11.18 a unit.
Another 1.5 mus are generated by the Board's diesel power generating units at Brahmapuram near Kochi and Kozhikode.
Rise in demand coupled with decline in availability might force the Board to buy power from the BSES plant here, they said.
Adequate transmission lines would have helped to evacuate power from outside at competitive rates, the sources added.
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