Amidst shortage of coal in thermal power stations, the power crisis may deepen in the densely populated state of Uttar Pradesh as there is still a gap of 30 per cent in coal requirement and supply.
Against the daily requirement of 87,900 metric tons, the supply of coal is only 61,300 MT.
The total availability of power on Thursday/Friday was 18,600 megawatt against the demand of about 22,000 MW. UP gets 8,000 MW from central sector thermal plants, 5,500 MW from independent power producers or from private sector, UP Thermal Power Generation Corporation generates 4,000 MW of electricity while 600 MW is hydro power.
Even as the UP and Central governments denied shortage of coal, the Moradabad division of Northern Railway on Thursday cancelled eight passenger trains for faster movement of goods trains carrying coal. The Railways on Friday cancelled 240 passenger trains across the country to ensure fast movement of coal to thermal power plants. The Railways has given priority to goods trains carrying coal to the thermal power stations due to which the movement of passenger trains has been cancelled.
In the last 38 years, the demand for electricity was highest in the month of April this year. While there was a power shortage of 1.1 per cent in the month of October due to the coal crisis, it was 1.4 per cent in the first fortnight of April. In Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Punjab, Jharkhand, Haryana, there are power cuts ranging from 3 per cent to 8.7 per cent.
According to UP Power Corporation Limited sources, the average rostering (power cuts) on Wednesday-Thursday night was as much as 7:43 hours in rural areas, 5:05 hours in semi-urban towns (tehsils headquarters), 5:20 hours in nagar panchayat headquarters and 5:50 hours in Bundelkhand. While the divisional headquarters and metro cities have been exempted from official rostering, there have been widespread reports of local faults that have led to forced rostering.
Sources in the UPPCL said while the demand on Wednesday had shot up to 21,222 MW, the maximum demand met was only 19,022 MW, which led to massive power cuts in the state, with the average load shedding increasing to seven to eight hours a day.
Meanwhile, the All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) has blamed the lack of coordination amongst Union ministries of Coal, Railways and Energy for the coal shortage causing power crisis across the country. The AIPEF said on Friday that every ministry claimed that it was not responsible for the present mess in the power sector.
AIPEF chairman Shailendra Dubey said that now the Union ministers had diverted the issue and linked it to inability of states to make timely payments to coal companies.
He said the Central Electricity Authority monitored 173 thermal plants across the country, and 106 thermal plants had coal stock at critical levels as per the latest daily coal report of April 27.
In the case of 150 thermal plants using domestic coal, the number of plants with critical coal stock has increased from 81 to 86 in one week. In the private sector, the number of thermal plants with critical coal stock has also increased from 28 to 32. At least 12 out of 15 thermal plants using imported coal are in the critical category as the cost of imported coal has risen sharply. They are not willing to procure imported coal at escalated rates. Among such plants, 14 are in the private sector, the power engineers' body said. In addition to this, eight thermal plants owned by private parties were not operating at all, it said.
Dubey said plants with about 72,000 MW total capacity were closed during the present crisis mostly due to non availability of fuel while gas based plants with installed capacity of 20, 000 MW were totally closed. He said against the requirement of about 22 million MT domestic coal for thermal power plants only 16.4 million MT coal was available every day. He said the inventory of coal was depleting everyday and had reached a critical position.
