Govt asks officials to prepare long-term mitigation plan
Efforts on to purchase power from outside to tide over the crisis, says Peddireddy
Vijayawada/Visakhapatnam: As the unprecedented power demand and severe shortage of coal have forced several States scrambling for electricity, the Andhra Pradesh Government has emphasised the need for power utilities to devise a long-term plan for sustainability of 24x7 power supply and strengthen the power sector to deal with any exigency in future.
As a short-term measure the government bought 34.86 MUs by paying an amount of Rs.40.23 crore. AP Discoms have met 218.92 MU of power demand on April 30 as against the total demand met on the same day in 2021 was 202.83 MU registering a growth of 7.93 per cent year-on-year. The peak demand during the day was 11,767 MW.
"Ours is the only government in the country which has taken bold and wise decisions to procure power from SECI to the tune of 7,000 MW at a highly cost effective rate of Rs 2.49 per unit," a senior official of AP Transco said on Sunday.
The national power consumption hit a record of 207 Giga Watts on April 29. Also the peak hour deficit was 10.8 Giga Watts on April 28 which was the highest since 2012.
Despite a grim scenario with regard to coal availability in the wake of war, the State Government is providing reliable power supply to domestic and agriculture sectors, the government contended.
During the review of power supply positions with power utilities through teleconference, Energy Minister Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy said that "the prevailing power shortage is only a temporary phenomenon and the government is confident of overcoming the situation soon. We don't have coal pit heads and we need to invariably depend on Mahanadi Coalfields and Singareni Collieries."
He said that adequate coal is not available to thermal power plants due to various constraints at national and international level. At the same time, there is an unexpected rise in demand due to abnormal increases in temperatures. As a result, the power purchase cost has hit a record high in the last 10 years. Apart from coal shortage, limited availability of power in the open market has forced the utilities to impose restrictions in the industrial sector. It is expected that the wind generation will start increasing from May 15 in renewable energy (RE) rich States in the country including Andhra Pradesh, thereby increasing the availability of power and further ramp up of wind generation by the end of the month.
The Minister the government is monitoring the+ power supply position on a daily basis as per directions of the Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy and putting maximum efforts to improve the power supply position in
the State. "Our ultimate objective is to provide 24x7 power supply on a sustainable basis and strengthen the power sector for economic development of the State and to provide better services to the consumers," he stated.
The Minister emphasised the need for power utilities to devise a long term plan for sustainability of 24x7 power supply and strengthen the power sector. However, the common man is not affected as the government is supplying reliable power supply to the domestic sector besides ensuring seven-hour power supply during day time to the agriculture sector and the utilities have been purchasing power even at higher prices as per the availability.
In view of severe shortage of power, the Minister specifically directed GENCO to expedite the commissioning of 800 MW thermal power plant at Krishnapatnam Phase-2 by month-end or first week of June. Apart from 15 major States, metros like Delhi (National Capital Region) and Mumbai (financial capital) were forced to impose power restrictions due to unprecedented coal shortage, grid officials informed the Minister.
Explaining the power infrastructure developments of DISCOMs, the officials said that the distribution transformer failures (DTR) were reduced to 3.14 per cent in FY 2021-22 from 5.47 per cent in 2018-19 in APEPDCL. In APSPDCL, the DTR failures have come down to 4.96 per cent in FY 2021-22 from 6.09 per cent in 2018-19. The DTR failures in APCPDCL were decreased to 4.44 per cent in FY 2021-22 from 4.625 in 2018-19.The Grid officials said that APDISCOMs have met 215.34 MU of power demand on April 29.
