The Hindu : New Delhi News : Delhi hit hard by power and water crisis

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Mar 08, 2008
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

New Delhi

New Delhi

Delhi hit hard by power and water crisis

Smriti Kak Ramachandran

One long dark morning for the Capital and suburbs

- Photo: V.V. Krishnan

No Power, no train: New Delhi railway station at a standstill on Friday morning.

NEW DELHI: The Capital and its suburbs woke up to the twin crises of power and water shortage on Friday morning due to tripping of supply lines of the Northern Grid. The cascading effect of the sudden power outage affected production at water treatment plants, causing a shortfall in supply.

According to Power Department officials, the tripping was caused by the presence of fog in North India. “Forty-nine supply lines of a 400 kV power grid, of which six belonged to Delhi, collapsed due to the presence of fog. It was a ripple effect, it began with one line and ended affecting 48 others,” explained S.R. Sethi, Director Operations of Delhi Transco Limited.

“Around 4 a.m. on Friday, lines that carry power from Rihand, Singrauli, Tala to Dadri and Delhi tripped, disrupting power supply,” he said, adding that supply was restored by noon.

Islanded systems at the Badarpur, Rajghat and Indraprastha plants that supply power to parts of South and Central Delhi offered some relief. “Power from these plants along with those at Mehrauli, Okhla and Sarita Vihar was used to meet the demand of the South and Central parts of the Capital and to run essential services like Delhi airport, the Delhi Metro railway and the water works,” Mr. Sethi said.

While the Power Department claimed that supply turned normal after 7-30 a.m., electricity in most parts of the city was restored only around noon. “Supply up to 1,500 MW was affected in Delhi area. The entire system was normalised after the Dadri thermal power station supplying power to Delhi was restored around noon,” Mr. Sethi said. Already reeling under a water crisis owing to shortage of supply from Haryana and due to the bursting of a pipeline that carries water to South Delhi, the Capital’s water woes were compounded by Friday morning’s power failure. “The water treatment plants in the city were shut down for about three hours. Though we had already begun the process of releasing water, the sudden disruption in production affected supply to some parts of the Capital,” said Delhi Jal Board Chief Executive Officer Arun Mathur.

Many areas in South Delhi including Gulmohar Park, Panchsheel Park, Greater Kailash-I, Asiad Village and Anand Lok went without water.

“Repair work on the underground pipeline feeding South Delhi that burst on Wednesday is expected to be completed by Friday evening and water supply in the affected areas would be restored by Saturday morning,” he said.

To counter the impact of tripping, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation switched to another source of power supply to ensure minimal disruption in train movement. “We were able to run the service without significant delays because of proper advance planning for such occurrences,” said Anuj Dayal, Chief PRO of DMRC.

The Metro draws power through the sub-stations of Delhi Transco that supply power to six locations. Train movement between Delhi and its suburbs was also affected due to the collapse of the supply lines.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

New Delhi