Power availability improves as Harduaganj unit functional again

LUCKNOW : The Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Ltd (UPPCL) has claimed it supplied electricity to all rural, semi-urban and urban areas as per the roster without resorting to any extra load shedding on Monday after it made arrangements for 2,000 MW additional power.

The power availability further improved after the UP Rajya Vidyut Utpadan Nigam’s 660 MW Harduaganj thermal unit resumed production on Monday.

The unit had been closed for the last several days due to a boiler tube leakage.

The corporation started buying around 1600 MW power from other sources from Sunday.

“On Monday, rural areas were provided power for 18.19 hours, Bundelkhand 21 hours, nagar panchayats 22 hours, tehsil headquarters 21.54 hours and district headquarters and bigger cities 24 hours,” a UPPCL spokesman said.

Holding a meeting here, principal secretary (energy) and UPPCL chairman M Devraj said it was very essential that state’s power plants made optimum generation. He asked officials to take all precautionary measures to ensure that no power production unit was closed for technical glitches in view of the crisis.

He also asked officials to ensure smooth power supply to people on the occasion of festivals while trying to avoid unnecessary and prolonged shutdowns.

Focus on preventive maintenance: minister

Later, energy minister AK Sharma also held a meeting with the officials in the Shakti Bhawan to monitor the situation.

He asked officials to focus on preventive maintenance to avoid local faults that, he said, aggravated the crisis. He directed officials to make an action plan to reduce line losses to save energy. Sharma also reiterated the chief minister’s directives to the officials.