Residents in several parts of the city woke up on Thursday to longer hours of power cut.
In areas that usually had load-shedding from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m., power supply was restored only at 9 a.m. Similarly, the two hour load-shedding in the afternoon went up to three hours. Thus, it was nearly eight hours of power cut in the city on Thursday.
An official of the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco) said that there are problems in some of the thermal power generation stations in the State. This has brought down generation. Further, demand has increased. However, this is only a temporary problem and load shedding duration will come down soon.
In Coimbatore district, the corporation has formed six groups and follows a schedule for load shedding for each group. Each group includes places from rural and urban areas and the city. The power cut duration is higher in rural areas, the official said.
Loss
J. James, president of Tamil Nadu Association for Micro and Cottage Enterprises, says that the power situation is only getting worse with the duration of power cut increasing. Several micro unit workers and owners have started looking out for job opportunities in other sectors. They do not want to incur loss by keeping the units open without work.
“It looks like we cannot expect any solution from Tangedco as the power shortage problem is on for the last five years,” he said. The association plans to hold discussions with other industrial bodies here next week and decide on the future course of action.
K. Kathirmathiyon, secretary of Coimbatore Consumer Cause, said the public are losing hope as there does not seem to be any effort to find a solution.
The public and industrial organisations have repeatedly appealed to Tangedco and the State Government, staged protests, and given suggestions. But, there is no improvement in the situation.
Tangedco is not informing the electricity consumers about the load shedding schedule or duration and is still not implementing load shedding in Chennai.
