E-Paper
State plunges into power crisis
THE STATE plunged into an acute power crisis on Friday after two Anpara units of 500 MW each stopped functioning around 5 pm. The units were expected to be functional by late night.
THE STATE plunged into an acute power crisis on Friday after two Anpara units of 500 MW each stopped functioning around 5 pm. The units were expected to be functional by late night.
The problem began when a water pipe in the Anpara B powerhouse cracked, flooding a part of the campus. Water led to some technical faults in two machines that generate 1,000 mw of power. With the outage of 1,000 mw of power, the total thermal generation dipped to as low as 1300 mw. Against the total demand for 7300 mw, the total power that was available from all the sources was only 4200 mw which included 600 hydro power and 3200-3300 mw import from the Central sector. This left a wide demand-supply gap of around 3,000 mw.
As a result, the UPPCL imposed heavy power cuts throughout the State to combat the situation. Almost all the towns, except those exempted from power cuts, were in the dark in the night.
The situation was equally bad in villages. According to a senior UPPLC officer, the situation would be normal after midnight when the fault was removed from the two power units.
