Industrialists: Need flexibility, not closure of units to rationalise power in Punjab

PATIALA: Industrialists in Mandi Gobindgarh town of Fatehgarh Sahib district on Wednesday held a meeting and decided to give a memorandum to the state government demanding flexibility in allowing them to use power up to 50% instead of closing the industry to meet the power demand.
Late on Monday evening, Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) extended the power restrictions and asked the large-scale industries in Punjab using more than 100 KW of load in central, north, and west zones to shut down for another three days till July 10 as the state is facing power shortage. The continuous supply industry has also been asked to use just 50% of the sanctioned load from July 8 to July 18. This is necessary to maintain 8-hour supply to the agriculture sector.
“There are around 350 industrial units in Fatehgarh Sahib using more than 100 KW load and the shut down will lead to huge losses. Several input costs, including labour cost, cannot be curtailed. We decided in the meeting to request the government to allow industry to operate on 50% power usage and the government can keep this restriction till the state is facing power shortage. We are ready to cooperate, but shutting down completely will leave a bad impact on the industry,” industrialists said.
The power shortage has continued to hit the state amid rising demand and low in-house generation. On Wednesday, even the third unit of Talwandi Sabo Power Limited (TSPL) thermal plant operated at half the load at around 335 MW. The loss of about 300 MW is a setback for PSPCL. Two units of 1980 MW thermal plant are already facing shut down while one unit had been lying shut since March this year, the other unit tripped on Saturday evening.
On Tuesday, the maximum power demand was 12,969 MW. There was a shortage of 775 MW during evening peak hours leading to imposition of power cuts on rural and small-town domestic consumers. The PSPCL supplied 3,006 lakh units of power and 944 lakh units were supplied by thermal units. The gross generation stands reduced to 5,031MW in the afternoon. The power supply from thermal units is 1,600 MW and 800MW from hydro units. The generation from private generators stands reduced at 2,175MW. On Monday too, the maximum power demand was 13,289 MW with a shortage of 450 MW and the maximum demand met was 12,839 MW.
The TSPL spokesperson said the second unit which faced technical problem on Saturday evening is likely to be operational again late by Wednesday.
In the past few weeks, the farmers had gheraoed the PSPCL employees at power grids across the state during the paddy season. Besides, the domestic sector has been witnessing scheduled and unscheduled power cuts.