By IANS,
New Delhi : The capital’s residents and industries can look forward to a summer free of power outages as the central government has assured the city supply of 200 MW more from next month.
“The state and central governments are making sincere efforts to provide a load shedding-free power supply to the city’s people. I discussed the issue at length with the union minister of state for power (Jairam Ramesh), who promised extra 200 MW power from May,” Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said here Sunday.
She was speaking to reporters at her residence after meeting Ramesh. Delhi Power Minister A.K. Walia, Chief Secretary Rakesh Mehta, Power Secretary Rajendra Kumar and officials of Delhi Transco Limited (DTL), the power distribution company, also attended the meeting.
“The power ministry will seriously consider increasing Delhi’s share from last year’s 22 percent to 40 percent from un-allocated power reserve as the requirement of the city-state is crucial. The city residents will not be allowed to face any difficulties due to load shedding,” an official statement quoted Ramesh as saying.
The Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) will supply additional power from the next month.
Dikshit apprised Ramesh of the city’s own generation capacity as well as the quantum it purchases from agencies. She expected the total supply to go up to around 9,000 MW in four years from the existing cumulative strength of around 3200 MW.
During the peak months, the demand of power in Delhi goes up to 4,300 MW, while supply veers around 3,500 MW at any point of time.
“Delhi has tied up with DVC for supply of around 2,500 MW by 2011-12. It will also get 1,500 MW gas-based power from Bawana, and 750 MW from Bamauli – both in Delhi – within two and a half years,” Dikshit said.
Capacity building on the electricity front is a priority concern for the city government, which intends to spend over Rs.45 billion on energy during 2007-12. Over Rs.6.15 billion would be spent in the new fiscal.
The Delhi government is also looking at a couple of new projects from the central government’s capacity addition programme for the 11th Five-Year Plan period (2007-12).