The New Nation - Internet Edition

Shamim Jahangir

The frequent power cut is hampering industrial production as well as disrupting the normal activities of the people.

At present, the peak demand exceeds 5000 MW, whereas, generation varies from 2900 MW-3335 MW leaving an unmet demand of 2100 MW to 1665 MW daily due to gas shortage. For the reason, residents at different parts of the country experienced 12 to 16 hours power outages, sources said.

'Now many of the PDB power units are generating less electricity because of gas shortage and some of the units have remained switched off. The PDB cannot generate around 580 MW of power because of gas shortage,' sources added.

The two power plants including Sikalbaha Barge Mounted power plant and Sikalbaha Steam power plant with the capacity of 50 MW of electricity generation could not come into operation yesterday following non-availability of gas.

Besides, the two units of Raozan power plant produced only 90 MW against the present production capacity of 360 MW following the short supply of gas.

Ghorasal Steam (unit-1,2,3,4) generated 620 MW against capacity of 750 MW due to poor gas supply.

Haripur GT power plant produced 30 MW against the capacity of 96 MW, Bhagabari GT generated 90 MW against the capacity of 100 MW, RPC Limited produced 126 MW against the capacity 210 MW of power yesterday due to the same reason.

The energy and power divisions are now at odds over gas supply to power plants as the energy division has decreased gas allocation for the plants, ignoring a Power Division request for more gas supply to increase power generation.

Petrobangla would not supply more than 660 million cubic feet of gas a day to the plants as it wanted to ensure proper supply to fertiliser plants, sources said.

High officials of PDB protested the decision of decreasing allocation of gas supply to power plants from 679mmcfd.

Although there was a consensus among Petrobangla and the Power Development Board that power plants would get 679mmcfd of gas, the board received an average supply of only around 655mmcfd in June, PDB said.

Power officials demanded gas supply of more than 700mmcfd to increase power generation to keep outage within a tolerable limit. The demand for gas for power plants is around 850mmcfd, sources added.

But energy officials said Petrobangla would not supply more than 660mmcfd to power plants as any increase in gas supply to such plants would result in decrease in gas supply to fertiliser plants.

Petrobangla now supplies about 1780mmcfd of gas, of which fertiliser plants receive 223mmcfd, industries, dwelling houses and CNG filling stations receive 883mmcfd while power plants receive about 660mmcfd.

There will be severe power outages because of generation shortage after the monsoon,' a high official of PDB said.

Of the total generation of power, 83.5 per cent has produced by gas run power plant, 7.1 per cent by petroleum run plants, 4.6 per cent by coal run power plants and rest of them produced by hydro.

Of the total power production, the industrial sector user are 47.32 per cent, 38.40 per cent domestic service, 7.18 per cent commercial sector and 7.10 per cent other, according to sources.

The industrial production at Dhaka, Chittagong and other parts of the country was seriously affected following the power cut.

Saifuzzaman Chowdhury Jabed, President of Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, " We have experienced seven to eight hour power outage at industrial units. Due to the reason, the production of the units has hampered seriously in Chittagong."

"The businessmen in Chittagong will discuss about the short term solution of power situation with the Chief Adviser of the Caretaker Government."

Bangladesh Textiles Mills Association President Abdul Hai Sarker told the New Nation that the production of small textile industries at Saver, Gazipur area have been seriously affected due to frequent power cut.

"The large scale textiles producing industries are running their production smoothly as they have captive power generation," he added.