Stop sudden power cuts, say residents

BANGALORE: "The unscheduled power cut of nearly eight hours has affected my work. I cannot even recharge the USP. We have made several attempts to call the Bescom office but no one answers the call," said Dapati Sinha, a resident of Horamavu Main Road, who also runs a consultancy firm, on Wednesday.
But citizens do not know that as per rules, Bescom is supposed to inform before carrying out load-shedding .
KERC chairman MR Sreenivasa Murthy said electricity supply companies have the leverage to carry out loadshedding in unexpected situations . But they have to inform people that they were facing a problem in supply and hence the power cuts.
Bescom MD P Manivannan said: "If power generating industries inform us how much power they will be able to supply , we will be able to announce the load-shedding schedule. Otherwise, it is difficult."
Officially, Bescom is resorting to three hours of loadshedding at different slots throughout the day. However, the situation seems to be worse in rural areas; they are facing nearly four hours of power cut.
Sridhar Prabhu, energy expert and advocate handling power issues, said to tide over the crisis, Bescom should approach KERC seeking public hearing on this issue.
KERC has to institute proceedings under Section 23 of Electricity Act if electricity supply companies are taking up load-shedding , he said. "Electricity regulatory commissions across the country have taken up these cases legally and apportioned the power supply depending on the availability. This has to be done even here."
With Bescom area facing a shortage of 500 to 600MW, the company has written to KERC seeking to purchase 27,000 million units of energy. But it says the cost of power has shot up with increase in demand. The power purchase cost during 6pm and 10pm has increased from Rs 4 to Rs 9 per unit on Wednesday. So Bescom says it is unable to purchase power at this prohibitive cost.
Bangalore City alone is facing a shortage of 500 to 600MW during peak hours every day.
TIME TARIFF
Manivannan said they are were planning to make time-of-the-day tariff mandatory. "We have filed a petition before KERC. That would mean higher rate for power during peak hours and relatively lower rate for nonpeak hours. Besides, we are planning to make pre-paid meters compulsory,” he said