Hyderabad, March 10: Unexpected problems led to the closure of five power plants including two independent power producers causing a loss of 1,260 MW leading to power outage in more than 10 districts across the state. However, the AP-Genco and AP-Transco officials reacted swiftly and restored power generation in three of the five power plants.
Rural areas in more than 10 districts of Anantapur, Kurnool, Nalgonda, Medak, Mahaboobnagar, Rangareddy, Warangal, and Adilabad suffered power cuts since last night. The officials said that the situation arose due to technical glitches in various power plants. Within a span of 48 hours, power generation at Kakatiya Thermal Power Project (KTPP)(500 MW), Unit-VII (120 MW) and Unit-II (60 MW) of Kothagudem Thermal Power Station (KTPS), and the Rayalaseema Thermal Power Project (RTPP) (200 MW) along with LANCO (100 MW) and Konaseema Thermal Power Projects (280 MW) came to halt leading to sudden loss of 1,260 MW supply to the state.
In addition, there was a loss of another 160 MW inter-state purchases due to outage of the merchant plant at Jindal (Karnataka). As a result, the state is suffering a shortfall of about 34 million units per day in power generation. Further, there is loss of another 2.5 MU per day due to reduction of 125 MU being supplied from the Central power grid of the southern region. Adding to the woes, the power consumption demand touched 254 MU which is highest in the history of the state. Hence, the distribution companies were forced to impose power cuts in different districts for hours together.
According to the officials, the state government is requesting the Central government for restoring the curtailed power of 238 MW to the state from the unallocated power of Central power grid in southern region. “The restoration of units is in full swing. We expect to solve the problems and restore power generation in the power plants within the next 24 hours. We request the consumers to cooperate and bear with us,” said senior officials of APTransco. The Unit-VII of KTPS, KTPP, Konaseema and another 100 MW unit of RTPP were restored late in the night.
–Agencies