Mah to petition CERC against overdrawal from central grid

Mumbai, Jan 25 (UNI) Maharashtra Government today said that it will petition the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) against violation of central grid discipline by northern states, resulting in shortage of supply to the western region for the last one month.

Addressing a press conference here, Energy Minister Dilip Walse Patil said the scheduled drawal by Northern region from the central grid is 679 MW and the actual drawal is 1,451 MW on January 18.

''Such overdrawal in the last one month has resulted in frequency going below 49 HZs,'' he added.

He said the Northern region is constantly overdrawing 600-700 MW excess power than scheduled from the Eastern region on the newly commissioned 400 KV Muzaffarpur-Gorakhpur line for most of the time in a day. The line is loaded up to 1,100-1,200 MW.

Since December 2006, demands have shown rising trends, frequency profile has gone down and touching frequently less than 49 Hz, thereby Under Frequency Relays (UFRs) are operated.

Due to the frequent UFR operations, load interruptions has increased for number of times during a day, he explained.

The minister said the current demand for power is 14,500 MW while the availability is 9,500 to 9,800 MW. There has been a 1,200 MW increase in the demand as compared to last year. It is expected that the demand will increase by 1,000 MW in months to come.

Mr Patil said he had spoken to union Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde, Energy secretary R V Shahi and the CERC on the violation of grid discipline by Northern states.

The state energy secretary is in New Delhi to discuss the future course of action and complete the legal formalities of petitioning the CERC which has already taken serious view of the matter.

Mr Patil said since January 5 due to technical faults, the power generation from 700 MW Ratnagiri Gas and Power Project Ltd (RGPPL) has come down to 340 MW. The state government was focussing on new power generation projects, Akshay Prakash Yogana, Single phasing and feeder separation programmes to bridge the shortfall.

The minister said the gas supply at RGPPL was likely to begin from June this year. While the repairs to correct the current technical faults are being undertaken and will be completed by April.

UNI