Power shortage: Grid managers brace for 18 ‘alert days’ in April
The Indian Express | 1 week ago | 22-03-2023 | 12:45 pm
The Indian Express
1 week ago | 22-03-2023 | 12:45 pm
INDIA’S ELECTRICITY grid is bracing for a tough summer, with an over 8 per cent surge in anticipated peak demand of 230 GW (giga watt) this year and the system operators bracing for an estimated 18 “alert days” in April where a serious power crunch could be on the cards, according to projections by the National Load Despatch Centre (NLDC).Last year’s peak demand of 211.6 GW was recorded in July.To tide over the surge in demand this summer, a series of steps have been initiated: the preventive maintenance schedule of conventional thermal plants during the April-June period has been deferred en masse for three months; and orders under Section 11 of the Electricity Act (which provides that the government may, under extraordinary circumstances, direct a generating company to operate and maintain any station) have been issued to developers of imported coal-fired plants to operate units on full capacity from March 16 to June 30. State distribution companies that have PPAs (power purchase agreements) with these plants have been accorded the first right of refusal for the generated electricity, and if they choose not to buy the generated power, the developers can then sell this electricity in the market.Also, orders have been issued to operationalise around 5,000 megawatt of gas-based generation (1,000 MW is equal to 1GW) of state-owned NTPC Ltd, and the generated electricity from these stations is to be sold to the PPA holders, while the balance generation is to be offloaded by the country’s largest power producer in the electricity market.As part of this arrangement, the fixed costs of operating the plant are to be determined by the CERC — the central electricity regulator — while the variable cost is to be market-determined, with the difference to be reimbursed to NTPC through the Power System Development Fund (PSDF, a regulatory fund created by the CERC).For these 18 days deemed as “critical”, NTPC’s power trading arm NVVN has been asked to contract and pool-in gas power suppliers and any under recoveries on this count is to be made up from the PSDF, officials indicated.In the northern region, the reservoir levels are good, but in the southern region, the levels are lower than normal and hydro generation is likely to be below expected levels. As a result, utilities in the south have been asked to conserve water, and use it to produce electricity in the evening hours in April.An advisory has also been issued to ensure 6 per cent blending of imported coal in conventional thermal plants to tide over any possible shortage of domestic supplies.So far, the plant load factor (PLF) of thermal power plants has been around 55 per cent. In the longer term, the Central Electricity Authority — the planning wing of the Power Ministry — has proposed that this minimum PLF be lowered to 45 per cent with some modifications of the machines, to eventually ensure that they can operate at a minimum stable load of about 40 per cent as a longer-term measure.A pre-feasibility exercise for offstream hydroelectric projects for storage use has also been discussed as a means of balancing out the variability of renewable energy, but progress on the ground is tardy.A viability grant for 4,000 MW of lithium-ion battery storage has been proposed in this year’s Budget, but shortage of lithium is a key hurdle and there are no viable alternatives other than lithium for large-scale storage at this point in time. Off-stream pumped storage is the only viable alternative for energy storage, but site selection and due diligence for these projects takes time.DESPITE adding renewable capacity, there is increasing realisation that India’s electricity grid is still dependent on an aging fleet of thermal plants.Renewable energy (RE) targets too are now getting stuck, with solar projects also coming up at a comparatively slower rate. “It is obvious from the Centre’s approach that the grid is critically dependent on the coal-based fleet of 30- to 35-year-old power plants. The addition of RE power is becoming a challenge to secure grid operation in the absence of energy storage devices. RE is not a dependable source of power without storage. The country’s old thermal plants are not capable of providing reliable reserve power during an emergency and we do not keep reserve shaft power or spinning reserves for automatic frequency response, which is now proving to be essential,” said a sectoral analyst, who is aware of the contingency measures being taken.The country’s current installed generation capacity is 410 GW. The alarm bells are ringing because of an intensification of multiple issues that have come to the fore every summer since the reopening of the economy after the pandemic shutdown: the continuing reliance on old, inflexible coal-fired plants for base load capacity, a shortage of both coal and gas that fuel thermal capacity and a pronounced reliance on renewable generation for meeting capacity addition target over the past decade or so. This reliance has thrown up challenges of a grid being increasingly powered by renewables available only during certain parts of the day that do not necessarily align with the peak demand curve.Of the installed capacity, the capacity from non-fossil fuel-based energy resources was 175 GW, which is well over 40 per cent of the total electric power installed capacity, with solar and wind accounting for the biggest chunk of this.India’s vast fleet of coal-fired thermal power plants of 200 MW series are more than 25 years old, run on old technology and do not promise robust reliability.Further, considering that India’s load demand is far from saturated, there is a compelling need to replace obsolete coal-based plants with supercritical coal-based plants that offer operational flexibility as an intermediate goal for total transition.However, this may not be acceptable to the international community in view of the impending climate crisis. Incidentally, China, which has been a renewable energy cheerleader for most of the last decade, has now approved the highest number of new coal-fired plants since 2015.Beijing authorised 106 GW of new coal power capacity last year, four times higher than the previous year, and the equivalent of 100 large-fired power plants, according to research from the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air and the Global Energy Monitor published last month.But the biggest overarching reason, according to multiple players involved in the supply chain business, has been the lack of cogent demand projection. There are two longer term decisions of the government that are being seen as factors that could have had a bearing on demand projections too: that there were practically no new thermal capacity projects to be taken up beyond 2022, beyond the 50,000 MW thermal capacity under construction since 2016, according to the Power Ministry’s National Electricity Plan for 2017-22, where the thrust was almost entirely on renewable energy for incremental capacity addition. Two, there was a clear policy discouragement of imported coal during that period, primarily in the wake of spiralling global coal prices. Both those decisions are now being tweaked in light of the demand surge.
