With Power Plants Down, Rural Areas to Face Load Shedding

BENGALURU: Rural areas in the state face severe power cuts over the next few days as coal shortage has forced two major thermal power units to shut down since Tuesday.

While the situation is expected to improve, rural areas may have to go without power for an additional two hours everyday.

On Wednesday, one 210 MW unit of the Raichur Thermal Power Station was down for annual maintenance. In addition, a 500 MW unit of the Bellary Thermal Power Station (BTPS) and a 600 MW unit of the Udupi Power Corporation Limited (UPCL) were shut down due to coal shortage.  According to officials, the 1,000 MW unit of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Station (KKNPP) was also down due to a turbine problem. The state receives about 442 MW of power from there.

Rural areas under BESCOM’s jurisdiction saw load shedding of up to three hours on Tuesday. The situation was better on Wednesday due to an injection of around 300 MW from wind power generation but the dual problems of coal shortage as well as central station outages will have an impact in the coming days.

“Of the 3,800 MW allocated to BESCOM areas, there was a shortage of 900 MW on Tuesday. We had to resort to load shedding for two to three hours in rural areas, and one hour in urban centres. However, Bangalore did not have load shedding,” said BESCOM MD Pankaj Kumar Pandey.

According to the State Load Dispatch Centre, both the BTPS and UPCL are expected to resume power generation from Thursday. KKNPP is likely to come online only late next month.