The change of weather with unbearable heat waves in April to moderate hot and humid weather in May this year made us happy, but it should have made the country's energy and power sector managers happier. At least now the power supply system managers will not be facing criticisms for unscheduled and frequent load shedding, offering intense sufferings to the people.
People, so far, has little satisfactory explanations for not attaining the targets of the government utility companies who earlier announced that there would be no power cuts from 2014. Load shedding of power (which is officially within 700-800 MW range) is still a reality despite significant raise in power generation.
The Prime Minister's Energy Adviser welcomed load shedding to remind people about the level of progress attained in the power sector. He made this statement on April 29, 2014 while talking to the media after Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the China Huadian Hong Kong Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of the China Huadian Corporation to set up 1,320 MW coal fired power plant at Moheshkhali Island in Cox's Bazar under joint venture. The Energy Adviser elaborated further that the country's power generation capacity reached 10,000 MW (installed), but it could hardly generate 7,000 MW as the power plants with approximately 2,000 MW capacity had been now under maintenance and some rental plants could not generate power to full capacity during the hottest months.
When weather becomes hot and humid, the demand for electricity is pushed up but the power generating plants reduce their capacity to run uninterrupted. This situation is acute especially in case of oil-fired rental and quick rental plants (18 plants out of 54 total power plants in operation) due to technical limitations. Because of the heat wave situation in the atmosphere, the plants get overheated and become susceptible to fire.
Power supply situation during the very hot April days worsened as the 450-MW Meghnaghat plant caught fire and had gone out of order. As per published report, BPDB claims that they are able to produce 3,900 MW from gas-fired power projects, 190 MW from the Kaptai hydro plant, 2,100 MW from rental and quick rental projects and 180 MW from coal.
Now-a-days, power generation shortages have been partly reduced by imported power from India. As per the agreements, BPDB should get 500 MW power from India through Bheramara-Baharampur interconnector. For last couple of months it has been a topic of discussion that approximately 470 MW power has been received through the interconnector as the transmission system loss eats up 30 MW of the total import volume. But statistics presented in the BPDB website during the hot spell of April shows that India exported significantly less volume of power without communicating BPDB.
Published report suggests, on April 22, BPDB received 400 MW of electricity in the day time and 304 MW in the evening. On April 23, BPDB received 352 MW during day time and 304 MW in the evening. On April 24, the supply was 396 MW in the day time and 304 MW in the evening. The shortages of approximately 200 MW supply was not communicated to BPDB. Therefore, the Power utility company managers are now reviewing whether there will be the requirements for supplementary agreements with India to get the secured supply of power as per agreement including the factors of transmission loss.
It may be mentioned here that Bangladesh Power Development Board signed an agreements for purchasing of 250 MW of electricity for 25 years with National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) of India. According to the bilateral agreement, India agreed to supply up to 250 MW of electricity every day from NTPC's power plants at the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC)-determined domestic tariff, for 25 years. The CERC tariff, may be revised depending on cost escalation. The agreed tariff during the signing of the agreement was pegged at Rs 4.33 a unit (Taka 5.5). As Bangladesh is free to import the residual 250 MW from the Indian open market, a separate short term agreement for four years was signed for additional 250 MW power import with the Indian private sector company, Indian Power Trading Company for 250 MW a day (supplied by Bengal State Electricity Distribution Co) at Rs 5.11 a unit (Taka 6. 5). The tenure of the agreement can be extended on the basis of mutually acceptable terms.
Bangladesh side has been negotiating with India for importing additional 100 MW power from the Palatana power plant in Tripura through a separate interconnector to be built. By 2030, Bangladesh contemplates to import approximately 3,500 MW of power from India.
The reality of the power supply situation indicates that Bangladesh needs to improve its own generation and distribution capacity which can support both the peak and off peak demands round the year, irrespective of temperature fluctuations in the atmosphere. It also requires timely maintenance of the generating units, improvements of transmission and distribution systems and developing some reserve generation capacity for meeting extreme situations. Also we need to keep in mind that the import dependence, be it power of primary fuel, will be accompanied by uncertainties beyond our control.
The writer is a mining Engineer. mushfiq41@yahoo.com
Power crisis: Improving generation and distribution capacity
Mushfiqur Rahman | Published: May 09, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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