The Hindu : New Delhi News : Centre to consider State’s demand

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New Delhi

Centre to consider State’s demand

Sujay Mehdudia

Increase in power quota to tide over crisis

State faces a deficit of around 400 MW
Karnataka has raised a similar demand

NEW DELHI: Faced with one of its worst power crises in the recent times, Karnataka and Kerala have petitioned the Central government to increase their quota from the central pool allocation in order to help it tide over the very serious situation leading to hours of power cuts and unscheduled load-shedding.

“I have received representations from the Karnataka and Kerala governments seeking assistance of the Union Power Ministry to get over the power crisis that have occurred due to the poor monsoon that has led to a sharp fall in water level in dams and reservoirs affecting generation of power.

“We are looking at the situation sympathetically and will certainly try and help these States to meet the power demand,” Union Minister of State for Power Jairam Ramesh said here on Wednesday.

Unallocated quota

In the case of Kerala, the Union Power Minister said Kerala’s Electricity Minister A.K. Balan had also urged enhancement of share from the central allocation as well as from the unallocated quota.

Poor monsoon

Mr. Balan had stated that due to the failure of the monsoon, the State was faced with a deficit of around 400 MW.

“Our Central allocation has been 1041 MW, of which we are getting only below 700 MW. This means a deficit of more than 50 per cent of the central allocation.

“Our unallocated share of power has also been drastically reduced to a meagre 29 MW instead of 180 MW. If the share of the State is restored we will be in a position to manage the present crisis without any hardship to the public at large,” Mr. Balan had said.

High consumption

The Karnataka government had petitioned that the energy availability was a fourth of the position as compared to last year. Daily consumption was at an all-time high and exceeded 118 million units compared to 85 million units last year.

In fact, Karnataka has stated that its share in the Central Generating Station in the southern region should be enhanced.

It stated that while Karnataka’s share of the Central Generating Station was only 1542 MW compared to 3173 MW of Tamil Nadu and 2954 MW of Andhra Pradesh.

“The Karnataka government has urged the Union Power Ministry to augment its share from 1542 MW to 2000 MW with immediate effect,” Mr. Jairam remarked.

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