Ministry’s take on power crisis

ISLAMABAD: Responding to a report on power crisis, a Ministry of Water and Power spokesman said on Friday total generation on Thursday remained 9600 to 10,100 MW during the peak hours, whereas the demand fluctuated between 11,600 to 12,800 MW. The demand and supply gap was 2000 to 2800MW, resulting into six to eight hours of load management. The spokesperson said it was incorrect that no action had been taken by the government to alleviate this problem and that government efforts were restricted to generation only. The generation addition is possible through foreign investment in the mid term as well as in long term. He said the impression that the government was paying no heed to efficiency improvement was contrary to the facts. During the last eight months, the recovery has improved by 1.3pc which is at 87.3pc. The losses during the same period cane down to 6.5pc from 7.3pc. Dawn Adds: The demand figure that the ministry has quoted is the same, which it has been claiming during January. The ministry can check its own demand record during the winter to find out the veracity of its claim. The total computed demand on Thursday was over 16,000MW, as conceded by the Pepco officials and proven by historical trend during April when mercury touches 40C in most parts of the country and consumers switch fans and air conditioning on. Generation, as officially quoted by the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC), in its feed to the media was 9,500MW. If one takes documented auxiliary and transmission losses of 6.5 per cent (or around 600MW) and 650MW to the Karachi Electric into account, the ministry is left with only 8250MW. It still has to supply power to around 300 feeders, which are exempted from loadshedding, costing the system another around 900MW. That leaves power planners with only 7350MW to juggle around in relatively hot weather. They still exclude 20pc distribution losses (inefficiency, technical) that the distribution companies suffer while supplying power to the end consumers. If the ministry’s claim of demand and supply is true, it needs to investigate why distribution companies carried out up to 12 hour loadshedding on urban and up to 18 hours on rural feeders despite having `adequate’ power supply. The ministry should have also explained why plants of around 2,700MW could not be provided fuel and why its recoveries are hovering at 85 per cent (July-Feb)