Haryana to face power shortage of 1200 MW during the summer…

Power India  found that Haryana is expected to face longer power cuts this summer as three thermal units of 1200 Mega Watt (MW) capacity are under forced outage for the next two months.

Two units of 300 MW each at Yamuna Nagar thermal are under major breakdown after vibrations were noticed in the turbines .The Chinese Shanghai make. units were installed by Reliance Infra under EPC contract from Haryana Power Generation Corporation Ltd (HPGCL) in 2008.

The turbine rotor of unit no. 2 was bent on 25th September last year after water entered the turbine .The rotor has been sent to Baroda for straightening the rotor and the cost involved touching Rs 5 crore. The unit no. 1 has also faced turbine vibration and is on forced outage since March 31.The turbine blades were found broken.

Now 600 MW unit no. 1 of Khedar (Hissar) thermal plant has been closed on 28th April after vibration in turbine. The thermal authorities have sought a 40 days’ work permit to set right the defect. The new units of Chinese make are developing faults in the turbine at Khedar as well as Yamunanagar while the much older units of BHEL at Panipat are performing well.

All the three units under breakdown are not likely to be revived before end June and will force authorities to impose long power cuts in coming summer months. The state will be facing minimum shortage of 288 lakh units daily on account of forced outage of three units.

All India Power Engineers Federation in a letter to Power Ministry has claimed that there is widespread perception amongst engineers is that in order to win the EPC bids for Yamunanagar and Khedar projects Reliance quoted lowest rates for the worst quality of Chinese equipment which is now getting exposed. The repeated breakdown of newly constructed Chinese units in Haryana is raising question marks on quality.

To make things worse the newly constructed units of China Light and Power at Jhajjar with capacity 660 MW each are not running due to inadequate coal allocation. Coal India has reportedly refused to sign coal agreements with units commissioned after December31.

In addition to forced outages the normal boiler leakages will make the power position worse.

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