The provincial metropolis and Islamabad were without power on Tuesday following a technical fault at the Gutti 500kv power transmission in Multan paralysing life and industrial activities.
The irritating and repetitive power-cuts have prompted a five-member committee headed by senior Technical and Planning Manager Arshad Raza to submit an inquiry report within 72 hours. Pakistan Electricity Power Supply Company Managing Director Munawar Baseer told a press conference on Tuesday.
The power went off at 0905 hours when the 500kv in Multan's Gatti transmission line tripped after the technical fault, resulting in the tripping of other 500 and 220kv transmission lines and loss of 2600mw generation - apparently 25 percent of the available generation capacity.
Baseer said the inter-tripping system put in place by the National Transmission Distribution Company prevented the system from collapsing and damaging the 500kv and 220kv system equipment, such as transformers and generators.
About the subsequent chain of events, he went on to say the inter-tripping scheme had split the system into two parts - North and South of Multan - and limited the power disruption to only the North. The power system South remained normal, he added. "The Southern Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan continued getting power. The power supply through Karachi Electric Supply Company has also remained unaffected," he said.
He also said the National Power Control Centre in Islamabad acted under the Emergency Response System and restored the power to Islamabad at 0947 hours by interconnecting the Mangla system through 220kv Mangla-Rawat line. The Tarbela Hydel Power Station and Tarbela-Sangjani line were restored. The 220kv and 500kv systems to Lahore, Faisalabad and other areas were partially restored by 1430 hours and fully restored at 1513 hours. He told reporters that the committee would submit a comprehensive report covering the analysis of network operations, protective system in place and anomalies.
"The committee will then present clear recommendations and specific solutions in the network protection and control system to avoid such mishaps in the future," he added. He said his company had set up state-of-art call centres in FESCO, LESCO and IESCO under the company's supervision and also rental powerhouses and rehabilitation of the existing thermal power plants.
He went on, "The company is pursuing a plan in two ways - one from the demand side and the second from the supply management. Targeting of 1800mw for 2008, the company is adding 425mw on a fast-track rental generation, 550mw by adding a new rental plant and 300 more by rehabilitating the current GENCO owned generation plants. PEPCO has targeted 1850mw in 2008 by energy conservation initiatives. As earlier mentioned, PEPCO has achieved its target of 500mw of saving by the energy conservation campaign. Further, a medium-term plan to enhance the generation capacity of 6100mw has also been articulated."
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