The Hindu : New Delhi News : Committee set up to examine tripping of power supply lines

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Monday, Mar 10, 2008
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Committee set up to examine tripping of power supply lines

Smriti Kak Ramachandran

It is expected to suggest an antidote for such occurrences

NEW DELHI: The Union Power Ministry has set up a committee to come up with preventive measures to save cities from being plunged into darkness by tripping of power carrying lines by both man-made and natural causes.

Taking cognisance of the recent tripping of power supplying lines of the Northern Grid that caused blackouts in several parts of North India including Delhi, senior officials of the Ministry met in the city on Sunday to draw a blueprint for resolving the crisis.

Even as “untimely fog” and “pollution” were identified as reasons for the tripping, the Ministry has instructed a committee steered by a member of the Grid Operations of Power Grid to come up with solutions to fend off such occurrences.

“The committee has been asked to examine the causes and suggest an antidote to them. Such incidents of tripping caused by fog and pollution at this time of the year are not commonplace and therefore there is a need to find a way to meet the challenge,” said a senior official.

Listing the measures that are being taken to solve the problem, the official said: “To begin with Delhi Transco and Power Grid have been instructed to clean the critical areas where the tripping occurred on a war footing. Long-term measures that can prevent recurrence of such incidents were also discussed.”

Polymer insulators

Officials said the Ministry was looking at the use of polymer insulators that can resist the disturbance by pollutants and fog. “Apart from switching to polymer insulators on all 400 kV lines, it was decided to increase the insulating levels of the lines so that pollutants cannot affect them,” a source said.

The Ministry has also decided to examine the nature of pollutants to be able to come up with specific solutions to counter them. He said: “Though the conventional maintenance of lines between October and December has already been carried out, we will now need to clean the affected areas through manual cleaning.”

The use of helicopters for cleaning lines having been found unsuitable for the Indian conditions and the process of bringing down insulating disks for cleaning equally cumbersome, the affected lines near Bawana, Ballabgarh, Mandola sub-station will be cleaned manually.

“The situation returns to normal once the sun comes out, but the cleaning of lines will require more attention, especially since the tripping was caused three days in a row. The design of the lines also needs to be studied and upgraded wherever the need arises,” the official said.

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