There is no relief in sight for the city residents who are reeling under the frequent power outages.
The UT Administration on Wednesday announced scheduled power cuts in the city to maintain the grid discipline and save costly power transformer from damage.
One to two hours power cuts have been announced on daily basis in various sectors of the city. The sectors that would be affected due to power cuts includes Sector 8 B & C, 20 A, B and C, 21 A, B and D, 22 C and D, parts of 26, 27, 28, 35 B, 34 C and D, Sector 33 A and D, Sector 35 A, B and C, 36 among others.
This season, the power demand has reached 340 MW on May 23. And, the demand for power is expected to reach 400 MW in the peak of summer, which was 353 MW last year in the city.
An official of the UT Electricity Department said, “In order to safeguard the electricity distribution system from the over loading due to peak summer season and to safe guard the interest of the power grid security as well as to maintain grid discipline, the need based rotational load shedding has been planned in the union territory of Chandigarh effective from May 30.
He said: “Due to overloading at the feeder emanating from 66 KV grid sub-station Sector 18, feeders emanating from 33 KV grid sub-station Sector 18, feeders emanating from 33 KV grid sub-station Sector 34, feeders emanating from 66 KV grid sub-station BBMB, NPH, the Department has to resort to power cuts to save costly power transformer from damage.”
The administration also requested the residents to restrict the use of Air conditioner to the minimum possible and the temperature setting of the AC should not be allowed to go below 25-26 degree Celsius.