Power crisis: Centre, states are trying to resolve the situation

The heat is on. In more ways than one. A scorching summer here before time, an uptick in industrial and agricultural activities combined with an acute shortage of coal have India facing its worst power crisis in six years. Over a heated blame-game, the Centre and states are frantically trying to resolve the situation.

Currently, some 59 per cent of the power plants dependent on domestic coal are running low on coal stock, and the total stock in pithead and non-pithead power plants is barely around 31 per cent of the normative stock.

The result? Power cuts in Delhi, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Punjab, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Haryana. Rajasthan is now 33 per cent energy deficit; Haryana, 14 per cent; Madhya Pradesh, 11 per cent; and Uttar Pradesh, 4.5 per cent.

India had a total peak power demand of 186,950 megawatt (MW) on April 30 (latest data available) and the shortfall was 127.82 million units (MU). On April 29, power demand had touched a record high of 207,111 MW as temperatures crossed 44 degrees Celsius in 14 states.

Desperate measures

Rajasthan, the worst affected, has reportedly announced scheduled daily power cuts across the state: one-hour in divisional headquarters; two-hour in district headquarters; and three-hour in municipal areas and towns.

The Gujarat government has asked industries to give staggered weekly offs to the staff to balance out power consumption, said Pathik Patwari, senior vice president, Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry. On a year-on-year basis, the daily demand in Gujarat is up by 35-40 per cent.

Odisha has hit its peak power demand of 4,567 MW a month in advance and is now facing a shortfall of 200-250 MW. Add to this, the state unit is having its scheduled annual maintenance shutdown and there is forced outage at an NTPC unit. So, the state has resorted to load regulation from 7 pm to past midnight.

“The government is emphatic there should be no regulation during day time,” said Trilochan Panda, MD, Gridco, the state-owned bulk power trading utility.

Maharashtra — with its massive demand of 28,000-odd MW a day, which is expected to touch 30,000 MW by June — has managed to avoid load-shedding for the last 10 days. The power distributors met the demand even though it was nearly 2,500 MW higher than last year.  But it’s running low on coal stocks. Maharashtra state power generation units, say power experts, require over 141,000 metric tonnes (MT) of coal daily. The plants have a buffer stock of 595,000 MT, just about enough for 1.5 to six days.

“MahaGenco will import around 1.4 million MT of additional coal — some 400,000 MT per day by mid-May,” said a state government official. MahaGenco supplies 7,700 MW of the 24,200 MW distributed by MahaVitaran daily.

Tamil Nadu is also looking to import 480,000 MT of coal before May 20. The Centre has urged states to increase imports for the next three years.

Going green

In this moment of crisis, some states are seeking recourse in renewable energy (RE).

Tamil Nadu generated 17.62 MU on April 29 through wind power, which has helped, said a government official.

And in Gujarat, when power consumption shot past 21,000 MW on Friday, the government was able to meet the demand without load-shedding, courtesy RE. “Besides existing thermal capacity, we met the demand through solar and wind power,” said Jay Prakash Shivhare, MD, Gujarat Urja Vikas Nigam Ltd.

In Karnataka, G Kumar Naik, additional chief secretary to the energy department, said, “Our installed renewable capacity is around 52 per cent of our requirement. Currently, 35-40 per cent of the demand is met purely by RE.”

West Bengal, which has been boosting its coal production, has so far managed to avert the crisis. Though it has a linkage agreement with Coal India Ltd (CIL) for 14.27 million metric tonnes (MMT), it produced about 12.3 MMT last year from its own captive mines. This year, it is scheduled to produce 19 MMT, said P B Salim, CMD, West Bengal Power Development Corporation, which generates the bulk of the state’s power supply.

The first SOS call on the crisis had come from the Delhi government earlier in the week, when it flagged concerns about a nationwide power crisis. It had also warned of disruptions in services like the Metro and in hospitals. But over the weekend, no such disruptions were reported, though industrial units in the National Capital Region were impacted. Union power minister has expressed “displeasure at Delhi Government misleading public with incorrect information about power situation.”

Centre vs states

The Centre has, meanwhile, accused the states of not clearing their dues to Coal India.

According to the coal ministry, power companies in various states have rising dues to CIL: Maharashtra (Rs 2,608 crore), West Bengal (Rs 1,066 crore), Jharkhand’s Tenughat Vidyut Nigam (Rs 1,018 crore) and Tamil Nadu’s Tangedco (Rs 823.92 crore).

“Although the dues pertaining to the state gencos such as Maharashtra, Rajasthan and West Bengal are very high, CIL never regulated supply to these gencos and made adequate supply as per the sub-group plan and availability of rakes,” a CIL statement said.

It’s a cycle. Discoms owe generation companies and generation companies owe Coal India. As of now, discoms owe generation companies a total of around Rs 1.02 trillion. States like Tamil Nadu (Rs 22,829 crore) and Maharashtra (Rs 19,649 crore) account for the larger share.

(Shine Jacob, Viveat Susan Pinto, Aneesh Phadnis, Vinay Umarji, Ritwik Sharma and Ishita Ayan Dutt contributed to this report)