Power cuts to be back soon in Krishna district?

‘Situation grim enough for power cuts to keep demand-supply gap at manageable levels’

The Southern Power Distribution Company Limited (SPDCL) will review the power supply scenario in the district after Sankranti and it is most likely to impose power cuts in Vijayawada city and all towns, while the villages have already been bearing with ‘emergency load relief’ for long hours.

The spate of complaints that SPDCL offices are receiving about the undeclared power cuts in rural areas, which have been causing fluctuations across the distribution network, forced it to have a re-look at the situation. A top official of SPDCL told The Hindu that the situation was grim enough to impose power cuts in the coming days to strike a balance and to keep the demand-supply gap at manageable levels.

Power deficit in the State stood at well over 1,000 MW (as on Monday) leaving the four distribution companies (NPDCL, EPDCL, SPDCL and CPDCL) with no option but to impose curbs.

On its part, the SPDCL will review the position in the next few days and fix the power cut timings accordingly. The position has been bad since the last week or so and many parts of the district, including some pockets of Vijayawada city, experienced erratic power supply.

The upcoming round of power cuts is bound to be a cause for worry as the demand shoots up along with the slow but steadily rising temperatures across the region. People have to bear with power cuts for at least two hours in Vijayawada city and Machilipatnam.

Dip in generation

Krishna district has about 13 lakh power connections (including two lakh plus in the non-domestic category) whose demand is roughly 12 million units per day but the SPDCL, like other distribution companies, is not able to meet the full requirement mainly due to the fall in generation at thermal stations.

Technically, the thermal stations are operating well below their Plant Load Factors due to operational and logistical issues. Power supply will improve only when the distribution companies start receiving their full quotas from the thermal stations, which is bound to take quite some time.