Electricity supply has fallen short of demand by 1.6 percent (1.88 billion units) in the first 27 days of April—the worst shortfall in six years. As a result, from J&K to Andhra, many Indian states face 2-8 hours of power cuts. States like Rajasthan, Harayana, AP, and Gujarat are reeling under severe blackouts.
Electricity demand peaking this summer
On Friday, the country’s peak demand reached an all-time high of 207,111 MW at 2.50 pm, as per a ministry of power tweet. A day before that, it had reached a record 204.65 GW. However, the power shortage stood at 10.77 GW. Going by the trend, the ministry cautioned that demand could go up to 215-220 GW by May-June this year.
However, assuring consumers, the ministry said, “The government and other stakeholders are working together to ensure unhindered power supply and efforts at all fronts are being made, and measures are being taken for better utilization of various resources.”
Extreme summer, heatwaves in many states and acute coal shortage are driving power demand on one side and supply shortage on the other. IMD announced that this March was the hottest in India in over a century.
Shortage of coal
The shortage of trains to transport coal is also a crucial reason. According to power secretary Alok Kumar, train availability remained 6 percent lower than required. He said, “Railways was supplying 390 trains per day on an average, 14 percent lower than demand and 6 percent lower than the railways’ own commitment.”
India consumes over a billion tons of coal a year, of which three-fourths are utilized by power plants that contribute to 75 percent of India’s power generation. State-run Coal India, which delivers 80 percent of India’s coal output, increased production by 27.2 percent to produce 53 m tons in April. Compared to previous years, these figures are said to be higher.
Meanwhile, on Friday evening, Railways announced that it is canceling 753 trips involving 42 passenger trains to free up the tracks to ship coal rakes to power generation plants.
Reference: Power crisis: Maximum all India power demand met crosses