Inside the high-precision world of India’s power grid management

Not many who pass by a nondescript building on the way to the Sitaram Bhartia Institute of Science and Research in south Delhi would be aware of its importance in their lives. Nestled into south Delhi’s leafy Qutab Institutional area, this building houses the National Load Despatch Centre (NLDC)—the nerve centre of India’s power grid system.

It is the NLDC that sits at the top of an extensive network designed to ensure that India gets the electricity that it needs. Often unimaginatively compared to the air traffic control, it’s the NLDC’s highly trained team of operators, working in three stressful shifts of eight hours each, who keep an eagle eye on India’s national power grid— capable of transferring 105 gigawatts (GW) of electricity from one corner of the country to another.

To put this into perspective, this quantum of electricity is enough to take care of the entire power demand of the UK. While orchestrating this daily dance of moving electricity across the country is a challenge even under normal circumstances, the covid-19 pandemic has imposed some unique difficulties. Power demand fluctuated over the course of 2020, as many industries shut and homes consumed power for longer durations.

“We run the single largest synchronous grid in the world. There are challenges but we have managed (during the pandemic),” said K.V.S. Bawa, chairman and managing director, Power System Operation Corp. Ltd (Posoco). State-run Posoco oversees the country’s critical electricity load management functions through the NLDC and a set of regional load dispatch centres (RLDCs) and state load despatch centres (SLDCs). India has 33 SLDCs, five RLDCs—for the five regional grids that form the national grid—and one NLDC.

“What will happen if (the) electricity stops?” wonders Sushil Kumar Soonee, an advisor with Posoco and the man credited with building a robust power system that dances in tandem to fulfil the country’s electricity needs. A grid collapse is the worst-case scenario for any transmission utility; if this happens, states that draw power from that particular network will go without power.

“It is difficult to explain the immensely complex set of operations that ensure a continuous flow of electricity. Like all good things in life, one’s presence is only felt by one’s absence.