What's hot in Indian power sector?

• Power trading is "ON" in India. Companies such as Jindal Power and states like Chhattisgar, J&K and MP have sold power on short term basis through the grid.
• India is the 6th largest consumer of power. That is roughly 4 % of global consumption.
• Solar India is shining bright:- Karnataka Power Corp. has set up 3 MW solar power plant. This is just the begining.
• Private power players have cropped up in Hydel sector. KSK of Karnataka has bagged 2000MW contract from Arunachal govt., ousting....guess? ( NHPC !!)
• What happens in multibillion dollar procurements in Indian power sector ? NTPC's bulk order of boilers is yet to be finalised as L&T was decalred invalid in round#1. NTPC plans to add 32000 MW in 12th plan.
• Chinese power sector manufacturers have hit the first road block as Power Grid has put up a condition that they must have set up manufacturing facility in India !
• Guess which neighbor of India is being helped this time? Its Afghanista ! Their engineers first batch completed Transformer training in Ahmedabad.
• How much Indian metros consume? A back of envelop calculation goes like this:- Assuming 7 metros like Delhi ( @ 5000MW each) , our metros only need 35000 MW power. Imagine how much is left for rest of the country !
• Boom boom time. Thats it for power sector in India. You know who is coming up with mega projects? Reliance,Aditya Birla and Hirananadanis. Jobseekers, be ready !
• Many a slip between the cup and the lip. Dismal Indian nuke power generation plan is again in limbo after initial hopes generated after Indo-US civil nuke deal. This time Ministry of Environment has returned 4 new proposals of NPCIL.

Power Sector Snippets

• Large hydro potential is available in India. ( In north and north-east of the country). 25 GW is already used, 20 GW is under implementation and further 66 GW is still available.



• Purnea and Gorakhpur are Indias biggest FACTS projects.



• HTSC ( High Temperature Super Conduction) is stioll to come to India.


• At present only 3 % of the total volume of electricity handled by grid ( = 15000 GWh) is traded in India. Power trading is growing @ 6 % per annum.


• Power trading improves capacity utilisation, reduces unit costs, raises farm and industrial output and cuts down need for new projects.

Some issues in Indian power sector

• Generation Capacity addition during last 2 years has been far below the targets. Target for 2007 -08 was 16,000 MW , actual aws only 9,000MW. Target for 2008-09 was 11,000 MW , actual was 3,000 MW. We are slipping in the year 2009-10 also. Anybody held responsible?
• T&D revenue losses are increasing unabated. The loss is huge. Every year Rs.50,000 crore are lost in T&D.
• Untapped potential in Small Hydropwer is 80%. Most of this is in North-east.
• Gas based power plants operate on best PLF. India has adequate gas reserves, yet the contribution of Gas based plants in total generating capacity is only 10 %

Some plans for Indian Power Sector

• Inter-reginal power capacity planned for the national grid:- 40,000 MW by 2012.
• Performance of Electricity ( as one of the six infrastructure industries) this year(2009-10):-expansion of 6.5 %.
• Part of total cost of power distribution projects towards cables:- 10 %
• Gas based power plants capacity plannedin XII plan :- 10,000 MW.
• Investment outlay for Generation in XII plan:- Rs 500,000 Crore
• Size of Indian Transformer Industry :- Rs 12,000 Crore.
• Investment required during XIth plan in power sector :- Rs. 10 Billion ( Rs. 1000,000 Crore)

Power and India

• Present installed generating capacity is 1,30,000MW.
• Plan to add generating capacity of 60,000 MW during 2007-2012.
• Projected investment in power generation:- USD 70 billion.
• Projected inestment in power transmission and distribution :- USD 60 billion.
• India is growing consistently @ 7%.
• In 90s India's exports were of USD 20 billion , today they are of USD 100 billion.
  India has forex reserves of USD 150 billion.

Huge manpower required in Indian Power sector

To sustain 9% GDP growth rate, India needs to add more power generation capacity in the next 10 years than it did in last 50 years.
This means an investment of $300 billion in next 5 years alone and planning commission has estimated a requirement of 5 lakh additional skilled professional by 2017 .

Growth in Transmission Lines and substations in India

Wondered how much we added in our transmission lines in Xth plan? Here are the data:-
765 KV : 1700 Circuit KM
HVDC +-500KV : 60000 Circuit KM
HVDC 2200KV monoploe : 160 Circuit KM
400 KV : 75000 Circuit KM
220KV : 1,15,000 Circuit KM
Addition in substations during these 5 years was:-
HVDC Back to Back : 3000MW
HVDC Bipole+Monopole : 5000MW
765 KV :2000MVA
400 KV :90,000MVA
220 KV : 1,50,000 MVA

Power Shortfall- Will it ever get better?

Targetted capacity addition in last five years:- 41,000 MW
Actual capacity added:- 20,000 MW.

Targetted capacity addition in 2008-09:- 11,000 MW
Actaul capacity added :- 3,500 MW.

No resposibility fixed, nobody taken up.
We have power cuts even in Mumbai and 60 % of rural India has no electricity.

We boast of 1,50,000 MW installed power capacity but at any poin of time we cant generate more than 85,000 MW.
No wonder Inverter is an essential white good in Delhi homes.
Our ambition is to add 75,000 MW by 2012. We wont achieve it. Thats actually not our priority. Industries suffer, housholds swelter and people live in dark. India languishes but no one is there to put his foot down.

Power and Emmission

Electricty generation accunts for 57 % emission in India. And we lose 32 % of our generation Transmission and Distribution -TandD( someone called it Theft and Dacoity) losses. Todays level translate energy worth dollar 1 billion into carbon worth dollar 0.3 billion.
So one more aspect has been added to reduction in TandD losses. Emission.

PPPs face hard time in Maharashtra

Ever wondered whats ails Maharashtra's power sector ? Govt invites PPPs with great euphoria , signs MoUs with them and 3 years down the line they are left in lurch. Babudom makes sure that land acquisitions remain impossible and power purchase agreements are not finalised. In 2005 state aimed at 13000 MW private power. This is nowhere in sight now. Only Tata, JSW and Reliance remain in the field now .
Local administration has played spoilsport as usual. No wonder we have power cuts in mumbai too.

Power Trading - The Future

With deregulation and privatisation in the transmission sector, power trading , though in small quantity has begun. The next decade will see its growth and resultant chaos. Why? 'coz we have experienced as in US and Europe, that connecting many weak grids together with large varying loads causes blackouts.
Why at all we go for power trading- well, thats something we cant do without. We need power, and it gets generated at many places. We connect all of them through regional grids. Now some of these grids are strong, but most are weak.
Lack of reserve capacity in any of the grid will collapse the whole system.
Solution:- Go for UHV ( 1000 KV) or DC ( 800 KV) use FACTS ( Flexible AC transmission. )
Thousand KV line can transmit 10 GW power. Its really huge.
Load Flow, Power Oscillations and Voltage quality, these are the main concerns। If we want to integrate large Wind Farm with the grid, HVDC is best and sometimes the only solution .
Present challenges:-
1. To double the Inter-Regional Transmission capacity i.e. from 17000 MW to about 35000 MW.
2. To Integrate the regions:- Southern region is still not integrated.

Share in Generation

Ever wondered who generates how much in India? Here are the fugures:-

States :- 56 % ( 72,000 MW)

Centre:- 33% ( 43,000 MW)

Private:- 11% ( about 13,000 MW).

Note that Power is a subject of both state and centre lists like education.

And do you have any idea how much is India's demand? Its 5,75,000 Million Units

As far as mode of generation is concerned, Coal is still the leader in Thermal ( 66% of all):-
Coal :- 55% ( 70,000 MW)
Gas :- 10 % (13,000 MW)
Oil:- 1% (1,000 MW)

Hydro power contributes 26% ( 34,000 MW)
Nuclear is a big let down withjust 3% ( 4000 MW) contribution.
Renewables are picking up fast with 5 % ( 6500 MW) share.

History Of Electric Power

1749:- Benjamin Franklin produced electricity by friction.

1910:- Growth of Power Sector with the help of private licensee.

1947:- India had 1300 MW installed capacity.

1948:- SEBs were created.

1998:- Regulatory Commission formed.

2004:- Installed capacity reaches 1,14000 MW.

IE Act Section 42

There are 185 Clauses in the Indian Electricity Act, Section .
Main faeture of the same is:-
"Open Access for Generation, Transmission and Distribution"
Any guess how much it costs per MW to generate and distribute power?
Here are the Figures:-
Rs. 5 Crore /MW for generation.
Rs. 4.5 Crore /MW for distribution.

What is the main feature of Gas Turbines?
Ans:- It Requires Spinning Reserve.

Feed In Tariff

In order to encourage more and more distributed generation, CERC should set in place Feed in Tariff regime. Some states have these features, but not in a uniform way. Various states have contempltated the structure of FiT , but unless CERC steps in, the incentive for renewable energy will remain a far cry.
The term was imported from Germany and means the obligation for utlities to purchase at a set price the power from renewable energy producers.