NEW DELHI, Sept 14:
The Government today said the southern power transmission grid will be connected with the national grid by the first week of January, 2014.
“The Southern Grid, which has not been integrated yet, will be integrated by the first week of January, 2014… Once the entire southern grid is also connected, we will have one frequency across India,” Power Minister M Verappa Moily said.
He was addressing a gathering here after releasing a report “Green Energy Corridors” that had identified transmission infrastructure requirements for the renewable energy based power projects in 12th Five Year Plan.
According to Power Grid Corporation (PGCIL) Chairman, R N Naik, PGCIL is constructing a 800 kv transmission link between Raichur in Karnataka and Sholapur in Maharashtra to connect the southern grid with rest of the national grid.
“Raichur in Karnataka and Solapur in Maharashtra is the link which is under construction. It is 800 kv link. The target is to complete the work and connect by January, 2014,” he said.
The national grid is presently demarcated into five regional grids—Northern, Southern, Eastern, Western and North-eastern. Except the southern grid, all other grids are operating in synchronism since August 2006 and have a single frequency.
All the grids are being run by the state-owned Power Grid Corporation, which operates more than 95,000 circuit km of transmission lines.
The southern grid is presently linked with the national grid through a synchronous high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission line and has a different frequency.
The integration of southern grid will help States like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Puducherry in getting their due share of power from the national grid.
“Once the entire southern grid is also connected, we will have one frequency across India,” Moily said.
Power frequency reflects the load generation balance in the grid at a particular period and is one of the most important parameters for assessment of the security of power system and the quality of power supply.
The grids in the country have a permissible frequency band between 49.5 Hz to 50.2 Hz.
The country had faced its worst ever power crisis in the last week of July, when three grids—Northern, Eastern and North-Eastern—had failed due to host of reasons, including overdrawal of electricity by some States.
“We had the crisis (in July) but the crisis was not because of one factor but due to multiple factors. I have gone on record saying that such things will not recur again in this country… It can not be allowed (to happen),” the Power Minister said.
According to “Green Energy Corridor” report, Rs 43,000 crore investment will be required to set up transmission infrastructure and other related services for integration of renewable energy based power projects in the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17).
The infrastructure has been proposed to be set up in three phases starting from 2014-15 as the Government is planning to have 30,000 MW capacity addition through renewable energy sources.
At present, the country has power generation capacity of 2,00,000 MW. Of this, 12 per cent or 24,915 MW is through generation from renewable energy sources. (PTI)
Trending Now
E-Paper
Follow our WhatsApp channel