More power cuts for industries in the Thane-Belapur belt

VASHI: The Maharashtra state electricity board (MSEB) has declared that industries in Thane-Belapur belt will suffer unscheduled power cuts apart from the nine to 16 hours on Friday.
Even residential and commercial consumers in Airoli, Rabale, Digha and Ghansoli will continue to suffer additional power cuts apart from the schedule load shedding for three hours daily, till December 12 as per the new emergency load-shedding schedule announced by the Vashi division of MSEB.
The load-shedding regime and emergency power cuts schedule has been adopted with immediate effect, is aimed at reducing the burden on the existing transformer.
Right from morning 6 am to 11pm, there may be frequent power cuts in the prescribed area, says MSEB. However, in city, the regular 3 hours power cut schedule will continue the same way and if any faults arrive in power generation machinery, power cut can be on any day accordingly.
According to Nankumar, executive engineer 100 KV (O&M) division Kalwa on November 21, the 50 MVA transformer recorded 300 amperes less against the 12-1300 amperes load. He added that the 50MVA power transformer no 2 at 220KV sub station at Kalwa has become very weak and can cater to only 50 per cent of the full capacity. Hence to avoid further, complications TRANSCO has proposed for urgent repairs/ replacement of the above T/F which will take approximately 15 to 20 days.
Nandkumar added, "we have requested TBIA to co-operate by maintaining the load at minimum possible level and by transferring the load to the generator set if possible. We do not want to disturb residential consumers, therefore, we have diverted the load to the NOCIL sub station, which has a capacity of 25MVA. Apart form this, the industries that are drawing direct supply and express feeders consumers have assured us that they would switch on generators,".
"We are expecting the transformer within one week and by December 12, we hope to reinstall the transformer," assured PV Vijayan, superintendent engineer, extra high voltage [O&M], Kalwa division. There was a technical fault inside the oil chambers of the transformer causing instability to the gas pressure and consequently tripping the power supply. "Fortunately, we noticed the glitch at the right time otherwise, we would have been on Oxygen," said Nandkumar.
"Frequent power failures and voltage fluctuations are the order of the day at TBIA. For over a year now, the industries are facing frequent power cuts for long hours almost every day, or are forced to put up with low voltage owing to transformer repairs," remarked Jaydevan K, joint secretary TBIA.
For three months now, the medium and small scale industries at TBIA have been enduring voltage fluctuations. It takes hours and sometimes days to repair a transformer and TBIA is being supplied power from the neighbouring area.
Responding to complaints, an MSEDCL official said three more transformers had been sanctioned for the areas, including TBIA. Work was on to set up two more feeders of 22/11 kv capacity each.
The supply load in the industrial town and residential areas would be split among the three feeders, which would ensure equal distribution. The department extended an apology to the public for the inconvenience caused and appealed for the cooperation while they rectify the situation.