Bhubaneswar,: As power crisis looms large in the State due to heatwave and breakdown of NTPC’s one unit, Chief Secretary Suresh Chandra Mahapatra on Monday asked all power generation and distribution companies to ensure uninterrupted power supply in both urban and rural areas.
The Chief Secretary reviewed power supply situation in the State today in a high-level meeting organised on digital mode wherein the Principal Secretary Energy, Nikunja Bihari Dhal outlined the issues for discussion.
Gridco, OPTCL, OHPC, OPGC along with other power producing companies and discoms participated in deliberations.
After looking into the updates, Mahapatra directed to ensure power supply to all areas of the State both rural and urban. As there was rising heat and examination of the students would commence shortly, the discoms should ensure power supply to domestic users and commercial establishments on priority, he said.
With the sudden outage of one 800 MW capacity unit (Odisha share 400 MW) of NTPC’s Darlipali power station and non-availability of adequate power in the exchange, limited load regulation has become unavoidable. Efforts are being made to minimise inconvenience to the consumers, the Energy Department said in a tweet.
At the same time, the peak power demand has gone up by almost 10 per cent due to the hot weather conditions, officials said.
Odisha’s peak hour power demand (from 7 PM till 11 PM) these days has been estimated at 5,200 to 5,400 MW while the State generates 4,800 MW from different sources like hydro, thermal, independent power producers, central sector, power banking and renewable energy. It emerged that the present deficit is a temporary situation, they said.
During the review meeting, it was decided that Mahanadi Coalfield Ltd (MCL) would be asked to supply adequate coal to the independent power producers (IPPs) and improve the quality of coal supplied to OPGC.
The CS also directed discoms not to do any load regulation during day time. OHPC was asked to ramp up generation to meet the deficit during day time, sources said.
