Nagaland’s Power Supply improves

Al Ngullie
Morung Express News

Outlining the ‘situation of power supply’ in the states, Minister for state for Power KC Venugopal has observed that the position of power supply in some states have surplus at certain times. While none of the states in the country have surplus power both in terms of energy and peak, there are some that have surplus on seasonal basis or during certain hours of the day, Venugopal said.

Giving details in a written statement, the minister said in the Lok Sabha on December 2 that the demand ratio of Nagaland state has increased from the previous 80-84 Megawatts to about 106 Megawatts but the power Ministry’s latest statistics show that the requirement is met to some extent. Although meeting the full demand remains a challenge for a state shorn of power grids or electricity generation, the state isn’t limping either.

Minister of State for Power KC Venugopal said that latest to October 2011, Nagaland state requires at least 357 Million Units (MU) against availability of 324 MU of power. Comparatively, the surplus from the state is -33 MU while the deficit is about -9.2 megawatts. Nonetheless, the demand for power from the state stands at 106 Megawatts till October out of which 104 megawatts has been met. The surplus at peak is -2 Megawatts and the deficit at peak is -1.9 %.

What triggered the upsurge in Nagaland’s power supply is uncertain – perhaps Nagaland citizens have actually begun paying their electricity bills. Just five months ago, in May Nagaland’s Minister for Power, Doshehe Y Sema had announced that the state’s Power department is seeing improved collection of revenue for the financial year 2010-2011. The department has earned a revenue of ` 85.42 crore for the financial year as compared to ` 73.64 crore during 2009-2010. However, it also incurred a loss of ` 75.1 crore against an amount of ` 160.43 crore paid for power purchase from CPSUs and Likimro, he had said.

The minister said in his reply to the Lok Sabha that electricity is a concurrent subject and the responsibility for supply of power lies with the state government in concern and power utilities in the state.  “The government of India supplements the efforts of the state governments by establishing power plants and bulk power transmission system in Central Sector through Central Public Sector Undertakings (CPSUs),” the Minister for State said.

According to Venugopal the National Grid for evacuation of power from generating sources located in different regions in the country and facilitating transfer of power from surplus to deficit regions is in place.  In addition, he said, licenses have been granted for trading power.  

“Power exchanges have also been set up for facilitating transfer of power from surplus to deficit States.  The surplus power available with the states is also supplied by the States to other needy and desirous States under bilateral arrangements,” Venugopal said.

The minister observed the current position of power supply that none of the states in the country has surplus power both in terms of energy and peak. However, some states do have surplus on a seasonal basis or during certain hours of the day.