Kerala power crisis: KSEB gets 150 MW from central stations

The Kerala State Electricity Board has secured an additional 150 MW from central generating stations as the state continues to face a power shortage.

KSEB will begin drawing the additional power from Tuesday and expects the shortage to ease in the coming days as the national power situation improves.

At the same time, the state government has advised KSEB to wait before entering into a power purchase agreement with NTPC at Rs 30 per unit.

The government had given KSEB an in-principle go-ahead to purchase high-cost power if it was needed to deal with the shortage.

KSEB subsequently informed the government that power remained scarce and that NTPC had agreed to supply electricity at Rs 30 per unit.

The government has not rejected the proposal, but has advised the board to wait for a couple of days to see whether the shortage persists or eases across the country.

Power consumption in Kerala remains high because of relatively high atmospheric temperatures.

Peak demand in recent days was comparable to normal summer levels and was nearly 1,100 MW higher than demand recorded in September in previous years.

A shortfall of around 700 MW to 900 MW was expected on Monday compared with previous days.

The national power deficit of 12,000 MW reported by Grid Controller of India had also not been fully resolved.

The 200 MW that Kerala had been receiving from Madhya Pradesh through a swap arrangement was unavailable on Monday, adding to the shortfall.

KSEB, however, managed to arrange another 90 MW.

A senior KSEB official said the board would consider the NTPC power only if the national shortage continued.

“If indications are anything to go by, the power crisis at the national level may ease in the coming days. KSEB would go for the extremely high-cost NTPC power only if the scarcity persists across the country. Going by the trend, we don’t expect the situation to worsen further,” the official said.

The additional 150 MW from central generating stations is therefore expected to provide some relief while the state waits to see how the national power situation develops.