Government aims to cap load shedding at eight hours

KATHMANDU, July 9:

Load-shedding hours will be capped at eight hours during dry months this year, the government said in its policy and program on Wednesday, but there is no reliable basis yet for increasing generation to do so.

Last year, household user went through a maximum of 12 hours of power cuts while the outage for the industries was even more.

The policy and program document unveiled on Wednesday says that the undergoing construction of plants will be completed in time and all the power-plants will be operated in full capacity. Hydropower plants with a total capacity of 80 MW have been damaged by the April-25 quake.

The energy supply system requires at least 3 million units more energy per day to limit the blackout hours to eight hours but no substantial figures were available to bring the announcement into reality.

If everything goes as planned, Chameliya and Kulekhani III -- with a combined 44 MW installed capacity -- can be connected to the national grid. But generation of both will be only one-third during dry months. Both are government projects and no major hydropower projects are coming online into the system this year. Importing the energy from India could be a plan but construction of a substation at Dhalkebar won't be completed at least in the next twelve months though the laying of transmission lines will be completed in a few months.

"However, there is possibility of importing 80 MW from India by fitting temporary transformers in Indian territory with the permission of India," an official said, but the system won't be enough for keeping the government's words.

Moreover, the forecast for load-shedding also depends on water collection levels in the Kulekhani reservoir, Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) officials seeking not to be named say. Hydropower plants -- including the 45 MW Upper Bhotekoshi Hydropower Project -- remain damaged after the earthquake and they won't be ready for the upcoming dry months.

The various types of power plants in Nepal have a total 725 MW installed capacity. Most of them are hydropower plants whose generation comes down to one-third capacity during dry months.

Nepal's energy demand increases by about 8 percent every year.

Source: Republice