Punjab fails to enhance transmission capacity
Ruchika M Khanna
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, July 12
When Union Power Minister Raj Kumar Singh attacked the Punjab Government yesterday, saying the state had not enhanced its transmission capacity for many years, he was not off the mark. As the enhancement of transmission capacity takes several years, Punjab has not been able to keep pace with the rising demand in the peak season.
Rain eases burden
Scattered rain in the state led to the power demand falling by 8,000 MW on Monday. In the evening, it had fallen to 7,856 MW against 14,000 MW on Sunday. Though this meant relief for power utilities, the state couldn’t use 4,000 MW purchased for the day
Infra works on
A 400 KV substation is being installed at Ropar and an ICT is coming up in Moga. By the next paddy season, the transmission capacity will be increased to 8,000 MW and it 10,000 MW in two years,” an official said.
Though many in the power sector blame successive governments of deliberately going slow on the enhancement of transmission capacity in order to keep under control the free power given to farmers and other socio-economically vulnerable sections, the cash crunch with the state power utilities is also a major factor responsible for this “slow transmission capacity enhancement”.
Punjab has a transmission capacity of 6,400 MW for quite a few years now. The state’s capacity in 2011-12 was 4,700 MW, which means it has gone up by 1,700 MW in the past 10 years. On the other hand, as Punjab’s peak demand went up to over 15,000 MW this year, the power availability in the state, including its own generation and through short-term and long-term agreements, could not exceed 13,300 MW, resulting in a gap of 1,700 MW.
The state government has been claiming it has increased the transmission capacity to 8,000 MW. However, the Centre yesterday said the capacity had not been enhanced but only the power drawn from the Northern Grid had gone up as three units of the Talwandi Sabo Thermal Power Plant (TSPL) were shut. “The available transfer capability/total transfer capability is 7,900/7,300 MW with the outage of TSPL. When the plant is in generation at its optimum capacity, it is 7,400/6,800 MW,” a senior official in the state power utilities said.
Data available with The Tribune shows the state government has approved the upgrade of interconnecting transformers at six places, which will help the state increase its capacity, but paucity of funds is holding up the project.
