Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh government is far from achieving Power for All (PFA). Over 2.13 lakh distribution transformers, 85,000 feeders and 1,038 sub-stations of 400 KV to 33/11 KV needs to be built in Andhra Pradesh to ensure uninterrupted quality power supply to all.
Despite having achieved zero deficit i.e. meeting the daily power supply demand of 147 million units as on date, there are still over 2,000 hamlets with 4 lakh households without power connections in the state.
The power utilities require a whopping Rs 20,000 crore in the next five years to put in place this power infrastructure. The central government has agreed to extend financial assistance to the AP government, but only partially.
APDiscoms have set the process in motion and are planning to spend Rs 18,978 crore over the next five years under Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY), Integrated Power Development System (IPDS) and other Centre-sponsored schemes, in addition to the AP’s budgetary allocations.
“By 2018-19, the power requirement in AP will jump to 13,500 MW as compared to 6,158 MW currently. The annual power consumption will reach a whopping 82,392 MU as compared to 43,684 MU in 2013-14. So taking up power generation, development and distribution infrastructure is very essential,” a senior official of APTransco said.
Stating that the Chandrababu Naidu government has successfully brought down the energy deficit from 22 million units on June 2 to almost nil as on date, APGenco managing director K. Vijayanand said it has been planned to increase the installed capacity of the state from the existing 8,037 MW to 29,017 MW by March, 2019.
This capacity addition will be achieved in the next five years by an ideal mix of all generation sources of thermal, hydel, solar wind, central government share, nuclear power and gas.
Meanwhile, power generation in two units of Rayalaseema Thermal Power Plant was affected on Saturday following a technical problem. Officials said the problem was faced in Unit-3 and unit-5 due to tube leak. Power generation was restored in Unit-5 by evening and that of Unit-3 is expected to be restored by midnight.
There will be no impact on power supply to the domestic, commercial and industrial sectors, officials said.
