Hydro power for solving India’s electrical power crisis
http://www.archimedeshydroscrew.com/hydro-power-for-solving-indias-electrical-power-crisis/
http://www.archimedeshydroscrew.com/hydro-power-for-solving-indias-electrical-power-crisis/
http://www.archimedeshydroscrew.com
Hydro power for solving India’s electrical power crisis
Raj Kumar Sahu
Coal shortage has caused India’s biggest power crisis in recent times, but there appears to be no solution to the coal shortage.
Hydro power seems to be one of the solutions but are we doing enough to utilise thehydro power potential?
“At present not, but may be in future as the Teesta river has a large potential of hydro power,” said L K Gupta, chief engineer (civil) at NHPC, Teesta-V.
And as we start our journey to Sikkim to sample one of the hydro power plants, we experience that the hydro power sector itself is facing a crisis.
The first hurdle is roads. But as we reach our destination, one of the mega hydro power projects of NHPC on Teesta river, we realized the real potential of a hydro power project.
“We have total five hydro projects in Teesta river. We have two under construction projects in the same river that is located in west Bengal. We have approximately 1500 MW,” said Gupta.
So, it is not just state owned NHPC utilizing the water of Teesta, other companies like Lanco are also utilizing the same water downstream to utilize additional power. And the same process is possible in any of the rivers with hydro power potential.
India has hydro power potential of 1 lakh 50 thousand MW, but all that India has developed is 33000 MW of hydro power. China in contrast has a massive 80000 MW hydro power capacity. Despite huge potential of hydro power in North east states, only five percent of that potential has been cashed in those states.
But the region has hardly benefited. Take for example, Sikkim, which is power surplus and sells power to other states but still the locals are not new to power cuts.
And if that was not enough, natural disasters are proving to be another roadblock. The recent earthquake has almost robbed Sikkim of one of the under construction power plant, built by Private Sector JV co Teesta Urja Power.
Unlike thermal power plants, the crisis in Hydro power plants is absolutely different. For hydro plants, if the Mother Nature provides the fuel – water – to run these hydro power plants and ironically the same, nature shows its fury sometime.
Hydro power for solving India’s electrical power crisis
http://www.archimedeshydroscrew.com/hydro-power-for-solving-indias-electrical-power-crisis/
http://www.archimedeshydroscrew.com/hydro-power-for-solving-indias-electrical-power-crisis/
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