The decision by the government to shut down power plants daily for an hour, which became effective from April 20 seems to be totally meaningless, ineffective, uneconomic and technically unjustified. Shutting any generating unit, even a small one (say, 250KW), at the coolest time of night will not cool it down to any appreciable level. If at all so desperately needed, why not shut down one unit at a time, say from 11pm to 6am (not for one hour!), when power demand is at its lowest? This would be a better and more realistic solution. Or, take out one unit at a time, get its cooling system totally cleaned up, and put back overnight.
During my hands-on experience in the operation and maintenance of industrial plants and their power supply units (coal, oil or gas fired) for over 30 years, I have never seen or heard of such a crude and ineffective practice.
The fear that continuous running of a generating unit could lead to a fire (spontaneous combustion?), is simply unimaginable unless there is fuel gas leak, or a large amount of liquid fuel around the generator set.
Is something basically wrong with the ventilation system? If there is insufficient air flow in the generation room, then it is better to break the outer room walls (from outside) to increase cross ventilation or fix air supply fans to increase air flow. In my professional life, I have done this, when we expanded the plant capacity and the in-house generator had to run at over 85 per cent load for well over twenty hours a day.
The writer is an engineer sam@dhakacom.com
Shutting power plants daily for an hour!
S.A.Mansoor | Published: April 30, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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