- Furnace oil-based power plants not in production
-1200 to 1500 MW capacity, produce 4500 MW
- Govt. blaming private power plant owner
-There are 133 power plants in BD
Load-shedding has made the suffering of heatwaves more difficult across the country. While the electricity supply situation in the city is relatively normal, there is no end to complaints about load shedding in rural areas. Hourly load shedding is happening in remote areas. As a result, the state minister of power and other stakeholders are blaming for the non-cooperation of the private power plant owners for the overall situation.
According to the senior officials of the power department, the demand for electricity in summer this year is 1500 to 2000 MW less. If the private power plant owners had kept their furnace oil-based power plants in production, there would have been no load shedding. Now mainly gas and coal-based power plants are producing and supplying electricity. Furnace oil-based power plants are running at a low power factor. Their capacity is about 4500 MW. From there they are supposed to supply at least 2500 to 3000 MW of electricity to the national grid but they are supplying only 1200 to 1500 MW of electricity to the grid. As a result 100 to more than 1500 megawatts of electricity production have decreased from here.
According to media sources, a meeting of the power department was held last Sunday with the Bangladesh Independent Power Producer Association (BIPPA), an organization of private power plant owners, regarding the situation of electricity production and supply in summer. State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid, Senior Secretary of Power Department Md Habibur Rahman, Summit Group Director and BIPPA President Md Faisal Khan and its leaders and senior officials of the Power Department were present in the meeting.
According to the sources of the meeting, when the leaders of BIPPA tried to raise the issue of payment of their outstanding dues and the rise and fall of the dollar rate, the Minister of State for Power reacted angrily and said, "You are regularly receiving dues." If it is due, you will get that too. But it is not right to shut down the power plant in extreme heat on the pretext of arrears. Due to the shutdown of furnace oil-based power plants, load shedding has to be done in the village. He directed BIPPA to supply at least 2500 megawatts of electricity to the national grid by May 1, including running furnace oil-based power plants at 80 percent power factor.
When asked about the matter, the state minister said that I have told the owners of private power plants that the electricity demand is high now. As a result, at least 2500 megawatts of electricity from the furnace oil-based power plants will have to be supplied to the national grid. The main goal now is to provide relief to the people in Dabadah with electricity.
According to Bangladesh Power Development Board, there are 133 power plants in the country. Among them, there are 57 government and private gas-based power plants, with a production capacity of 11, 17 MW. At present, gas-based power plants are producing up to 7500 MW. There are 67 public and private power plants based on diesel and furnace oil. 47 of them are private. The production capacity of public-private oil-based power plants is 5 thousand 541 MW, of which the capacity of private plants is 4 thousand 362 MW. Out of which they supplied only 1 thousand 543 MW last Sunday.
According to sources in the power department, furnace oil-based power plants have almost shut down because private power plants are unable to open LCs and import fuel oil due to non-payment of dues. However, the electricity department is also angry with the power plant owners in such a position during the scorching heat when the electricity demand is highest.
Md Habibur Rahman, senior secretary of the electricity department, said, we do not want to provide any load shedding anywhere. Furnace oil-based power plants are generating less electricity. They have been instructed to produce maximum power from the beginning of May.
ZH
