The Hindu : KPTCL steps up load shedding

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jun 12, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka

KPTCL steps up load shedding

By Our Staff Reporter

BANGALORE JUNE 11. The Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Limited (KPTCL) has decided to effect load shedding in Bangalore city. A press release here on Wednesday said Bangalore Urban District would have one-hour load shedding in the morning and one-hour load shedding in the evening till power generation became normal. The other parts of the State would have an additional two hours of load shedding.

Till now, except Bangalore city, other areas had two-and-a-half to three hours of unscheduled load shedding. The latest decision means these places will now be without power for up to five hours a day. In fact, officials at the Load Dispatch Centre said that rural areas had had up to 50 per cent cut in their power supply.

Generation hit

At present, power generation from Central units had come down by 2,050 MW because of forced outages in those units, the KPTCL said. The officials said that the Kaiga Atomic Power Station was now functioning normally but four units at the Neyveli Lignite Corporation, one 500 MW unit at Ramagundam and one 500 MW unit at Talcher were unavailable. Earlier this month, seven towers at Talcher collapsed. "Now that has been repaired but we are only getting 60 MW," the officials said. "One 500 MW unit at Talcher is reserved for the southern region but power from there is not coming now," they said.

The unavailability of two Raichur Thermal Power Station (RTPS) units — one and two — 2 x 220 MW, had added to the problem and the KPTCL could not meet the daily requirements.

But the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company is to get 1,000 MW from KPTCL, whereas the other electricity supply companies will get only 300 MW to 400 MW. "This is because the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company has the most connected load," the officials explained.

Asked when normality would be restored, sources expected power generation to resume in one or two days. Asked if they would seek power from elsewhere, they said there was no power available anywhere.

Meeting tomorrow

Our Special Correspondent writes:

The Minister of State for Power, Basavaraj Patil Humnabad, on Wednesday said a meeting of the KPTCL officials would be convened on Friday to discuss the power situation in the wake of the delay in the onset of the monsoon which had affected power generation.

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