Energy Secretary N. Srikant said on Saturday that wild fluctuations in wind power generation on a daily basis across Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka grossly affected the grid stability.
As a consequence, Andhra Pradesh had 7,500 megawatts (MW) of unstable renewable power integrated in its grid of 10,000 MW capacity.
It was so unreliable that the difference between the forecast and actuals was ranging from as low as 50 MW to 2,400 MW in a matter of a few days, he said.
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‘Major challenge’
The difficulty in switching the thermal plants on and off at short notice and shortage of affordable power in the power exchanges were posing a major challenge.
In such a scenario, purchase of power on a weekly basis would lead to additional expenditure if the must-run wind power picked up. Together, these constraints made uninterrupted supply of power a tough task, Mr. Srikant observed during a teleconference with the Energy Department officials.
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Wind power generation stood at 1,299 MU and 1,171 MU in June 2018 and June 2019 respectively, and 1,081 MU in July 2018 and 989 MU in July 2019 (up to 18th).
The discoms supplied 181.65 MU per day on an average in June 2019 against a demand of 168.89 MU per day during the corresponding period in 2018.
The demand reached 175.34 MU in July 2019 against a demand of 151.86 MU in July 2018, registering a growth of 15.46%.
‘Release bulletins’
Against this backdrop, the discoms should release energy bulletins frequently to convey facts to the people, he instructed the officials while exhorting them to strive to supply power with zero interruptions.
He further said the government was keen on 24x7 quality power supply to all consumers, including domestic, industrial and commercial, and 9-hour daytime supply to agriculture sector.