As temperatures rise power situation in 12 states gets worse

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

New Delhi, Apr 27 (UNI) A nation-wide survey of the power situation in the country brings out that 12 States are heading for an acute power crisis, including industrially developed ones like Maharashtra, Gujarat and Haryana.

The survey by ASSOCHAM also brings out that industries in even some of the less industrialised states such as Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are heading for a severe power deficit.

The survey highlights that lack of fresh investments and modernisation coupled with huge transmission losses have aggravated the power shortages.

Energy deficit in many states like Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, and Haryana ranged from over 8 per cent to 27 per cent by mid-April.

Maharashtra, even after resorting to an average load shedding of 6-7 hours a day, is facing the worst crisis of 20 per cent with the deficit of over 1700 Million Units (MU) and peak deficit exceeding 4200 MW.

The state of Madhya Pradesh, which has a power requirement of over 3050 MU, has availability of 2300 MU with deficit ranging over 26 per cent.

The power deficit in Gujarat is nearly 13 per cent. The power available in the state is only 4780 MU against the requirement of 5500 MU.

In Uttar Pradesh, the deficit is almost 18 per cent since the requirement and availability gap is more than 800 MU.

In regionwise comparison, the survey found that the highly industrialised western region was the worst hit, which was about 17 per cent by mid-April last year. The availability in the region was about 16000 MU against the requirement of about 20000 MU.

''It is rather disturbing that many regions of the country are facing power shortage which in turn can hit the growth in industrial as also agricultural production,'' ASSOCHAM President Anil K Agarwal said.

The Northern region where Uttar Pradesh is the worst hit state, faced an overall deficit of 8 per cent with the requirement availability gap of about 1200 MU. In this region, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan are better off while Jammu and Kashmir, Haryana and Punjab are badly hit by shortages.

Bihar, with 40 per cent deficit is the worst hit state in the Eastern region which suffered an overall deficit of about 7 per cent.

However, the Southern region is better off facing deficit of less than 1 per cent. Most of the states including Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu had shortages of about 1 per cent.

The study said about ninety nine per cent of the business leaders in the country blamed power theft, leakages and transmission and commercial losses for the grave situation.

Pointing out that Delhi and Maharashtra incurred 50 and 40 per cent losses of power generated in transmission and distribution, the study said there is a serious need to carry out vigorous distribution reforms and anti-theft measures.

Highlighting the use of non-conventional sources of energy for domestic usage and street lightning, the study said Maharashtra has a potential to generate 5000 MW of electricity through wind energy and another 1500 MW by way of bagasse cogeneration.

Demand management and transfer of surplus power from the captive units to the state grids were the other suggestions cited to fight power shortages in tahe short run.

The Mumbai government has already proposed to switch off the lighting systems of large billboards from midnight.

UNI CS PK SSC1344

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