Informed sources told Business Recorder, Minister for Power, Omar Ayub was furious at the officials of Pepco and NTDC for not taking prior measures to deal with fog which is now an annual phenomenon.
According to an official statement, Minister for Power, Omar Ayub Khan has directed the NTDC to depute additional ground teams and increase monitoring and patrolling in the fog-hit areas to rectify any fault on high transmission lines promptly besides taking precautionary measures to avoid tripping in days to come.
He further directed the NTDC to take all necessary steps for restoration of tripped lines so that consumers can get uninterrupted power supply.
The minister along with Secretary Power, Irfan Ali visited the National Power Control Center (NPCC) and monitored restoration of the NTDC lines in Central and Southern Punjab hit by dense fog early morning.
MD, NTDC and General Manager NPCC briefed the Federal Minister and Secretary Power that due to heavy fog, 500KV and 220 KV transmission lines in NTDC network tripped resulting in reduction of power generation from plants like Guddu 747 and Balloki besides power failure to 220KV grid stations at Ghazi Road, Sarfrznagar, Bhawalpur, Vehari and Lal Sohanra.
The loss of generation resulted in under frequency load management of 249MW in Distribution Companies' 132 KV network. Six circuits of 500KV and 22 circuits of 220KV were affected by tripping. A total of 88 circuits of 132KV in LESCO, FESCO and MEPCO were affected as result of tripping of high transmission lines. Total power generation reduced due to tripping was 2977MW.
It was further revealed that due to generation reduction temporary load management of 3011MW was implemented in distribution companies. With improvement in power generation, the allocation is being gradually increased and the temporary load management will accordingly be reduced in DISCOs.
Due to fog, the column of air under the transmission lines conducting electricity shorted the system.