As the city continues to simmer under the intense heat, peak power demand in the national Capital reached to 6,934 MW at 3.28 pm on Friday, the highest ever recorded in the history of the city. The peak power demand had earlier soared to 6,651 on June 1 this year and broke the previous record of 6,526 MW recorded on June 6 last year.
A senior BSES official said, that this is the fourth time in the current month that last year's all-time high record of peak power demand of 6,526 MW has been broken. “It was 6,562 MW on June 5 and 6568 MW on June 7, other than Friday's highest level of 6934 MW and previous high of 6651 MW on June 1,” he said.
The Power discoms in the city had expected the peak demand to breach 7,000 MW mark in June this year. Jain had earlier predicted 7,000 MW power demand saying enough electricity was available to meet the rising demand.
“Highest electricity load ever of 6934 MW At 15:28:33 hrs on Friday in Delhi. May cross 7000 MW this year (sic),” Delhi's Power Minister Satyendar Jain tweeted.
Announcing the action plan for electricity supply arrangements in summer months, Jain had in March said, “We have enough backhand arrangements to meet the power demand that is expected to soar up to a historic 7,000 MW level in June this year.”
This year, the peak power demand crossed the 6,000 MW mark eight times, the BSES spokesperson said. Power demand had crossed the 6,000 MW only twice (6,021 MW on May 16 and 6,001 on May 26, in 2017. In 2016 too, the peak power demand had crossed the 6,000 MW twice (6,044 on May 19 and 6,188 on May 20).
The fact that the city's power demand crossed the 6,600 MW shows the robustness of the capital's distribution and transmission system, which has been able to measure up, the BSES spokesperson said.
The peak power demand in BSES discom BRPl areas -- South and West Delhi -- had reached 2,745 MW during the summers of 2017 and is expected to cross 2,880 MW this year.
In BYPl's areas of East and Central Delhi, the peak power demand which had reached 1,469 MW last year is expected to touch around 1,670 MW, he said.
The BSES official further said that to meet the demand of around 40 lakh consumers, arrangements have been firmed up by BRPl and BYPl to source adequate electricity. “It includes long-term Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) and banking arrangements with other States, including Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu and Bhutan,” the BSES official said.
The official also said that BSES discoms will get up to 665 MW of power through banking arrangements. Additionally, around 150 MW of renewable energy from Himachal Pradesh and around 20 MW from Rajasthan will further boost the power arrangements. In case of unforeseen contingencies because of low generation and outages of power plants, the discoms will purchase short-term power from the exchange, he added.
Official said that the BSES discoms invested substantial resources to strengthen the network. Also, to ensure reliable supply, it has also taken several steps such as preventive maintenance, strengthening of call the centre, load balancing at substations, deployment of additional manpower, setting up of dedicated team for monitoring of complaints, deployment of mobile transformers, and deployment of quick reaction teams to tackle exigencies, establishment of war room to review complaints and their resolution etc.
A Tata Power Delhi Distribution (Tata Power-DDl) official said that last year, the highest peak demand registered in Tata Power-DDl's area was 1852 MW and in overall Delhi it was 6526 MW. However, we have made adequate arrangements of power of up to 2,200MW, along with contingency planning, through long-term tie-ups and power banking arrangements, and upgraded network to ensure regular supply in our area of distribution, he said.