The Kerala State Electricity Board has re-commissioned two more generators (Generator I and III) of 55 MW capacity each at the Moozhiyar power house of the Sabarigiri hydro-electric project, making the total power generation at the State’s second largest hydel power station 280 MW.
Talking to The Hindu , KSEB Deputy Chief Engineer at Moozhiyar, Mohammedali Rawther, said Generator-I was put back into stream on Sunday afternoon and Generator-III on Tuesday after the satisfactory completion of the pre-commissioning tests and trial run.
VA Tech of Austria has completed the repair, modernisation and upgrading (RMU) of both the generators and handed over the same to KSEB a few days ago. KSEB has conducted a 72-hour efficiency test before adding the two machines to the stream, later, Mr. Rawther said.
According to him, three of the total six generators at the Moozhiyar were running in their full capacity and generators II, V and VI combined have been generating 170 MW of power equivalent to 4 million units on a daily basis.
Explosion
Power generation at the Moozhiyar power house was hit following an explosion in generator-IV on May 16, 2008. The explosion occurred while Generators III, IV, V and VI were running and the RMU work was underway on Generators I and II.
It is noteworthy that the exploded generator-IV was commissioned after completing its RMU work in February, 2007. All the machines were damaged in the explosion while Generator-IV was blown out and the KSEB had to replace it.
The board has already signed an agreement with the Chinese company, Poission De Leau, for replacing the blown out Generator-IV with an all new 60 MW generator at an estimated cost of Rs. 45 crore. According to Mr. Rawther, installation of the new generator is expected to complete in the next one-and-a-half years.
Alice Channel, an American company, had set up the Moozhiyar power house way back in 1966.
Reservoir level
Mr. Rawther said the water level in the twin reservoirs of Kaki and Anathode of the Sabarigiri project has been recorded at 980.50 metres against its full reservoir level (FRL) of 981.46 metres. However, no inflow has been recorded in the Sabarigiri reservoir during the past one week, he added.
