Grid linking to ease UP's power crisis

In a major relief to power-starved Uttar Pradesh, the northern power grid has been linked to the western, eastern and north-eastern power grids.

The linking of the northern grid with the three grids will not only stabilise the frequency of the northern grid but also improve the overall availability of power for the north Indian states.

The linking of the three power grids, besides being a leap towards establishing a national power grid, will enhance the overall availability of power in the northern grid and also ensure 300 Mw additional power for UP, from the 1,020 Mw Tala hydro-electric projects in Bhutan.

The UP Power Corporation, managing the power grid, had sounded a high alert across all 200 KV and 400 KV transmission substations in the state on Saturday. The officials of the Northern Region Load Dispatch Centre also camped in Lucknow to supervise the grid-linking operation.

The immediate benefit of the linking of the northern grid with three other grids to UP will be improvement in the frequency in the northern grid, thus enabling the state to overdraw from the grid without inviting penalty from the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC).

With the linking of the four grids, the availability of power in the northern grid has improved from the earlier 24,000 Mw to 60,000 Mw.

Among all northern states, the linking of the grids is boon particularly for the UP, as it could now easily overdraw against its quota from the northern grid, without fearing for the penalty by the CERC.

It may be recalled for ensuring the stability of the grid and ensuring grid discipline, the then NDA regime had imposed the 'Availability based tariff' regime, which stipulated a tariff as high as Rs 6 per unit, for drawing from the grid at the time of low frequency.