Capital's power woes may ease a bit this summer

Bawana plant to get more gas to generate electricity

Residents of the capital can expect some respite from frequent load shedding this summer. If all goes well, Bawana-based Pragati Power Corporation Ltd’s Pragati-III project may get supply of additional gas from Reliance to double its electricity generation capacity.

Chief minister Sheila Dikshit on Wednesday said the petroleum ministry has sanctioned additional 0.836 million metric standard cubic meter per day (MMSCMD) units of gas from KG-D6 basin of Reliance Industries Ltd for the Bawana power plant. This is in addition to the present 1.564 MMSCMD.

“A total of 2.40 MMSCMD gas will be made available for module-1. The gas is enough to generate 600 MW from module-1. Currently, this module is generating over 300 MW,” said Dikshit, after visiting the large gas-based power project at Bawana.

But she did not say how long would Reliance supply gas to the plant.

She was accompanied by power minister Haroon Yusuf and senior officers of the electricity department, PPCL and Bharat Heavy Electronics Ltd (BHEL). They also went to the control room of the plant.

Diskhit asked PPCL and BHEL officials to make module-2 operational by December-end.“The government has taken steps to overcome hassles on buying gas. The state government will also take up the issue of availability of 2.8 MMSCMD gas for module-2 with the petroleum ministry,” she said.

The Bawana power plant, built at a cost of Rs 4,500 crore, will have a total capacity of producing 1,500 MW once module-2 becomes operational. Module-1 of the plant, which can produce 750 MW, was completed in April 2011 but it produced only 300 MW since November last year. This happened because the Union oil ministry allocated 1.564 MMSCMD gas to plant owned by ONGC.

Demand for electricity in Delhi has been increasing at 8 per cent per year. While the demand last summer was 5,028 MW, this time it may reach 5,500 MW.

Delhi gets 2,400 MW from the Centre’s quota, while at least 1,000 MW is produced by Delhi’s own power stations. The rest is bought from neighbouring states. The Central Electricity Authority has estimated that demand in Delhi will reach 8,700 MW by 2017.