CHENNAI: With Prime Minister Modi asking everyone in the country to switch off lights and light lamps for nine minutes on Sunday, engineers belonging to the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco) are preparing to deal with voltage fluctuations and instabilities that may arise in the power grid.
Though nine minutes might seem like a short period of time, abrupt shutting off of lights can drastically disturb the supply-demand power equation and affect the distribution process in the future, said experts in the field.
But Tangedco officials who deal with load management said that they have taken precautionary measures to cooperate with the Prime Minister's request. On Friday, the state transmission company, TANTRANSCO, in a circular asked all its executive engineers to prepare for the situation on Sunday. They were asked to be present in their respective headquarters from 8pm to 10.30pm on Sunday and keep an eye on essential equipment like capacitor banks.
Top officials with Tangedco said that around 8.30pm on Sunday, the generation will be powered down by 2,000 MW, an approximate figure of the dip in power as calculated by the discom. Currently, Tamil Nadu has a power demand of 14,000 MW and generation will be brought down to 12,000 MW to match the reduced demand.
"It is true that certain imbalances will be created in the grid. But we are trying to bring down generation so as to match the reduced demand. This way frequency fluctuations in voltage can be kept at a minimum. All employees in the generation process have already been given instructions from load managers," said a senior official.
Furthermore, officials said no thermal stations will be shut down as it a cumbersome process to restart it. Instead, hydro stations and windmills that are far easier to handle will be turned off temporarily to decrease power generation.
"Windmills located in Dindigul, Coimbatore and Rameshwaram and hydro stations located around the Cauvery delta belt will be temporarily turned off. This is a very easy process. Only the barrages need to be shut in case of hydro stations," said another official.
To keep the dip in power demand as low as possible, officials have requested residents to switch off only lighting devices and keep the rest of their appliances like air-conditioner, television, fridge, microwave etc running as usual.
On the other hand, experts said that the Prime Minister's request has put the entire electricity sector in a grey area. Sudden blackouts and brownouts (partial blackouts), damage to distribution equiments like transformers, revenue loss to discoms and extra expenditure to maintain the equipment are the immediate
concerns. Also, Tamil Nadu procures around 1200 MW from other states like Maharastra and Odisha through power exchange, making the situation more unpredictable.
"This is an unnecessary exercise that could have been avoided because sudden reduction in generation can cause power blackouts. While major metro cities will be unharmed, tier 2 and tier 3 cities and villages will face the real brunt of this. The stress on the distribution sector will be massive too. Revenue loss during these nine minutes coupled with maintenance expenses are concerning factors too," said K Vishnu, a expert in the electricity field who is working with the Citizen Consumer and Civic Action Group.