State to face more powerless days ahead

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Call it irony extraordinaire. Only days after Electricity Minister Aryadan Mohammed informed the Assembly that the hydel reservoirs in Kerala were almost overflowing, the state is squirming in the midst of a power crisis that is only showing signs of worsening in the days ahead.Running out of options, the Kerala State Electricity Board on Saturday resorted to official daytime load-shedding.This is in addition to the half-an-hour load-shedding during peak evening hours already in place. The half-an-hour loadshedding between 6.30 pm and 10.30 pm will continue. The state was running short of over 550 MW in its central share, Mohammed said. “The state is short of 230 MW from Talcher, 135 MW from Ramagundam, 93 MW from Neyveli, 44 MW from Simhadri and 50 MW from the unallocated supply,’’ the Electricity Minister said.The crisis is such that daytime load-shedding has become inevitable. In fact, unofficial loadshedding was reported from various parts of the state on Saturday, especially from rural areas up north.The problem in coal supply at Orissa’s Talcher power plant and sub-optimal generation at the Ramagundam plant in Andhra Pradesh -- triggered by the Telangana row -- has caused an unexpected power crisis in South India.For Kerala, the crisis is particularly of a vicious nature since daily supply drastically affects power imports. For instance, on September 1, about half of the demand of 46.96 MU was met through home-developed hydel power.But now the KSEB has been forced to up its hydel share. On September 30, hydel power accounted for 31.36 MU - more than half - to meet the day’s demand of 51.55 MU. The fact that one generator at the Moolamattam power house of the 780 MW Idukki hydel project and two units at the Moozhiyar station of the 325 MW Sabarigiri hydel project are out-of-service has only added to the power woes of the state.The three units were expected to be operational only by November-December, the Electricity Minister said.