More power supply woes;Adanis, Tatas shut some units at Mundra

Some parts of the country might face significant electricity shortages with about 7,000 MW generation capacity getting impacted due to many power plants, including Mundra projects of Adanis and Tatas, shutting down some of their units.

This would be in addition to many power plants already being impacted by coal shortages. Over 34,000 MW generation capacity is under forced outage. Adani Power has shut down about six generating units at its 4,620 MW Mundra plant in Gujarat.

Besides, Tata Power has closed down two generating units at its 4,000 MW Mundra ultra mega power project on account of technical issues.

The Western Regional Grid witnessed a loss in generation of 3,143 MW on August 26 as many plants have been affected by coal shortages, according to Western Regional Load Despatch Centre (WRLDC).

Total capacity of Western Regional Grid is about 4,550 MW. Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chattishgarh, Goa, Daman & Diu, and Dadra & Nagar Haveli comes under this grid.

"Generation availability in Western Regional Grid is severely affected on account of coal shortage reported by state/central/private power stations," WRLDC said in a communication.

Adani Power today closed down at least six units at the Mundra plant reducing the overall electricity supply to the grid by 2,700 MW. The generation availability has further reduced by 2,700 MW because of closing down of units at Mundra project.

Unit 2, 3 and 4 -- each having 330 MW capacity -- have been shut "reportedly on coal shortage" while units 7,8 and 9 -- each having 660 MW capacity -- closed down "reportedly on account of payment default of Haryana utilities," WRLDC said.

When contacted, Adani Group declined to comment. Adani's Mundra project has five units of 660 MW each and four units of 330 MW each.

In a statement, Tata Power said its Mundra plant was maintaining the declared generation capacity. The 4,000 MW plant has five units, each having a capacity of 800 MW.

Coastal Gujarat Power Ltd (CGPL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tata Power, is implementing the project.

"Unit #2 of the UMPP has been down due to a boiler tube leakage while Unit #4 got down due to re-heater isolator leakage today evening. 2,400 MW is functional," the statement said.

Tatas Mundra project supplies power to Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana and Punjab while that of Adani gives electricity to Gujarat and Haryana.

On Monday, Supreme Court had stayed the Appellate Tribunal for Electricity's interim order allowing compensatory tariffs for the two Mundra projects. These projects have been impacted by change in Indonesian coal pricing policy.

"CGPL would like to add that it continues to look for early resolution to the ongoing issue of under-recovery of fuel price," Tata Power said in the statement.

India has an installed power generation capacity of nearly 2,50,000 MW. Out of more than 2,18,000 MW capacity monitored by the Central Electricity Authority (CEA), over 34,700 MW were under forced outage as on August 24.

Meanwhile, WRLDC, which manages the Western grid, has asked all constituents to maximise the available generation and or regulate load to maintain their drawal within their schedule in the interest of grid security.