By IANS,
Shimla : The Himachal Pradesh government has sought more power allocation from the central pool as the hydropower generation in the state has dipped by around 25 percent after several water channels froze at high altitudes.
Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal has recently written a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, urging him to allocate 400 MW power to the state on a regular basis, which would help the hill state meet the soaring power demand during winter, a government statement said.
In the letter, Dhumal said out of 32,000 MW power generated from eight ultra mega power projects across the country, the state had not been allocated any power share.
“The demand for power has gone up in the recent past due to rapid industrialisation in the state. During the past three years, the demand during the winter months (November to March) has increased from 2.8 billion units to five billion units,” an official of the state electricity board told IANS Saturday.
Sources in the electricity board said the power generation had already come down by 25, as the winter had started.
“Now, the total availability from the central government pool, state’s share in various projects and own generation will be around three billion units. This means the state is daily facing the shortage of one billion units during the winter months,” the official said.
As per agreement with other states, Himachal Pradesh will get 200 million units per day from Punjab and 450 million units from both Haryana and Delhi during winter. In return, the hill state will provide power to these states during summer.
Himachal Pradesh has a huge potential for generating 21,000 MW hydropower, of which only one-third has been exploited so far. It plans to tap about 12,000 MW by the 2012.