Table of Contents
What’s happening?
- There is only one-day stock of coal left in the thermal power station from where the national capital gets electricity,
- Delhi Power Minister Satyendar Jain said on Saturday after a meeting with the representatives of power distribution companies (discoms).
- This warning came after the Delhi Power Minister held a meeting with the representatives of power distribution companies (discoms) to discuss the “power crisis”.
- Jain said, “There is an acute shortage of coal in coal-fired power plants across the country.
- There is only one day’s stock left in the plants from which Delhi gets electricity, there is no coal at all.“
- Appealing to the government to transport coal to Delhi, Jain said, “There is an appeal to the central government to transport coal soon using railway wagons.”
Delhi’s electricity
- Jain further informed that all the plants are already running on only 55% capacity, instead of the full 3.4 lakh megawatt (MW) capacity.
- “Today, only 1 lakh MW demand is left instead of 3.4 lakh MW demand, but still, the power plants are not able to meet this demand.”
- Jain said that Delhi does have any coal plant of its own, the national capital has only small plants which produce gas.
- “We have a 1300 MW plant in Bawana, which runs on gas, where the gas supply was stopped yesterday.
- And the national capital does not have any coal plant of its own. Only three small plants are there which produce gas,” he said.
- He stated that at present Delhi is dependent upon the Centre’s plant which is provided when we demanded power supply.
- “After two days, there will be a complete blackout in the whole Delhi, if we do not receive more power supply from the Centre,” Jain added.
Solution?
- In order to resolve the power crisis in Delhi, Jain said that the government is ready to buy expensive electricity at present.
- “The capacity of our hydroelectric plants has also reduced from 45,000 MW to 30,000 MW. But, we want the plants to generate 45,000 MW of electricity during this peak hour.
- We have also made power purchase agreements with NTPC of 35,000 MW-45,000 MW. Still, we are ready to buy the expensive electricity today at the cost of ₹20 per unit, Jain added.
- Further, Jain called this power crisis a ‘man-made crisis’.
- “It seems that this power crisis is a man-made crisis, just like oxygen-crisis took place during the second wave of COVID-19 was also man-made,” he said.
- As India stands on the verge of running out of coal, 8 power plants have already stopped functioning in Uttar Pradesh and 6 power plants are already shut due to other reasons.
- At the moment, the demand for power in Uttar Pradesh stands between 20,000 to 21,000 MW but the supply remains at 17,000 MW.
- To deal with this, concerning authorities have announced a power cut of 4-5 hours in a few rural areas.
- The 14 temporarily shut power plants supplied 4520MW to the state.
Q) Coke which is obtained from Coal is used in the manufacturing of?
- Lead
- Iron
- Steel
- Copper
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