Electricity shortfall rose to a staggering 4,500MW on Wednesday, forcing the Pakistan Electric Power Company to resort to a massive 10-hour unscheduled load shedding across the country.
Karachi suffered eight to 10 hours of power shutdown.
Although figures released by Pepco put the deficit at 3,021MW, the prolonged country-wide load shedding belied those figures.
The company said the total demand was 12,441MW on Wednesday and it generated 9,420MW. Pepco said its thermal units produced 2,550MW, independent power producers contributed 5,535MW and 1,332MW came from the hydel component.
Wapda, however, disputed the figures on hydel generation, saying its peak hour contribution was about 2,500MW, and not 1,332MW as claimed by Pepco.
According to reports reaching , the duration of load shedding was between 12 and 15 hours on Wednesday. This is despite the fact that use of tubewells is at minimum these days as wheat crop has matured in Sindh and the last watering has been completed in Punjab. Had these 200,000 tubewells been operational, rural areas would have been virtually without electricity.
The textile industry called for a strike on Thursday on other accounts, but the situation was not any better than a shutdown on Wednesday either.
“No one now knows when will electricity go and come, and for how long. All this is taxing the industry of its financial promise,” he said.
The Karachi Electric Supply Company suffered a serious blow to its generation capacity as the Pakistan State Oil refused to continue fuel supply to the power utility on loan.
KESC’s shortfall reached 500MW on Wednesday.
While industrial areas faced about six hours of loadshedding, power outages stretched up to 10 hours in residential areas of the city.
The situation drew the attention of Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad who called both the KESC CEO and PSO MD to the Governor’s House and told them that people must not suffer because of an unsettled technical dispute between the two companies.
Karachi suffered eight to 10 hours of power shutdown.
Although figures released by Pepco put the deficit at 3,021MW, the prolonged country-wide load shedding belied those figures.
The company said the total demand was 12,441MW on Wednesday and it generated 9,420MW. Pepco said its thermal units produced 2,550MW, independent power producers contributed 5,535MW and 1,332MW came from the hydel component.
Wapda, however, disputed the figures on hydel generation, saying its peak hour contribution was about 2,500MW, and not 1,332MW as claimed by Pepco.
According to reports reaching , the duration of load shedding was between 12 and 15 hours on Wednesday. This is despite the fact that use of tubewells is at minimum these days as wheat crop has matured in Sindh and the last watering has been completed in Punjab. Had these 200,000 tubewells been operational, rural areas would have been virtually without electricity.
The textile industry called for a strike on Thursday on other accounts, but the situation was not any better than a shutdown on Wednesday either.
“No one now knows when will electricity go and come, and for how long. All this is taxing the industry of its financial promise,” he said.
The Karachi Electric Supply Company suffered a serious blow to its generation capacity as the Pakistan State Oil refused to continue fuel supply to the power utility on loan.
KESC’s shortfall reached 500MW on Wednesday.
While industrial areas faced about six hours of loadshedding, power outages stretched up to 10 hours in residential areas of the city.
The situation drew the attention of Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad who called both the KESC CEO and PSO MD to the Governor’s House and told them that people must not suffer because of an unsettled technical dispute between the two companies.
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