From the situation of struggling to meet even the highest of 5,661 MW intra-day peak load in June 2014, when Telangana was formed, the State has come a long way to meet the peak demand of 13,040 MW on Tuesday with the consumption being pulled by all sectors of consumers, particularly from agriculture and lift irrigation.
At 8.01 a.m. on February 25, the peak power demand in the State crossed the 13,000 MW barrier and recorded at about 13,040 MW. By doing so, Telangana has become the second State after Tamil Nadu among the Southern States now to handle the demand beyond 13,000 MW.
When contacted, Chairman and Managing Director of TS-Genco and TS-Transco D. Prabhakar Rao told The Hindu that there was only one instance wherein the peak demand had crossed the 13,000 MW barrier during combined Andhra Pradesh. It was in March 2014, the peak demand was recorded at 13,162 MW and at that time it was the first Southern State to do so as Tamil Naidu was second in terms of peak demand and energy consumption.
Stating that the peak demand of power was expected to go up further, Mr. Rao said it could soon cross the combined State record of 13,162 MW peak demand too.
Surpasses Karnataka
After bifurcation of combined AP into Telangana and AP, only Tamil Nadu had been recording demand of over 13,000 MW. In terms of energy consumption, Telangana had also surpassed Karnataka by registering around 250 million units (MU) every day for more than last one week and attributed the increase in demand to intensive agricultural operations and functioning of lift irrigation projects and schemes.
Cultivation of crops in the ongoing rabi season has reached about 17.57 lakh hectares, a record extent ever in Telangana for the season, with a lion’s share of it being covered by water-intensive paddy in about 12 lakh ha followed by other major crops such as maize in 1.86 lakh ha, bengalgram in 1.49 lakh ha and groundnut in 1.16 lakh ha.
Kaleshwaram pumping
“Pumping of water from Kaleshwaram project to replenish minor irrigation tanks is still going on to irrigate the standing crops and it will continue further,” a project engineer said.
When asked about the means of meeting the peaking energy demand in the State, Mr. Prabhakar Rao explained that they were procuring only about 30 million units a day under short-term purchases and the remaining 210 MU was being met from own generation (about 120 MU), central generating stations (50 MU) and other long-term purchases from Chhattisgarh, Sembcorp and others.
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