Srinagar, Jan 31: Owing to the low water level, the Power Development Department (PDD) is currently able to produce only 24 Megawatts (MWs) of electricity against the total capacity of around 250 MWs from the power plants in the Kashmir region.
A top official from Jammu and Kashmir State Power Development Corporation (JKSPDC) said: “From Kashmir power plants, we have a power generation capacity of around 250 MW out of which currently, we are producing only around 60 MW power.”
“Given low water availability, we can produce only 40 MW of power from lower Jhelum in the night hours 5 MW during the other hours, and 15 MW at Kangan,” the official said.
The official further said that from the power plants in Kangan, water was available for only one machine which has a power producing capacity of 150 MW. As of now, we can produce only around 15 MW of power from Kangan.”
“As of now, we are reserving the water to generate power during the peak hours. This is the routine power generation but in the upcoming month, we are expecting an increase in power generation,” he said.
The official further said, “We are in the middle of lean season and this year it started earlier in comparison to previous years.”
There is a total power generation capacity of around 1200 MW from the power projects of Jammu and Kashmir and 2250 MW from NHPC.
Pertinently, Jammu and Kashmir were facing a power generation shortage of nearly 80 % in November and December months.
From across the regions, PDD was generating only 200-260 MW of power from all power projects in Jammu and Kashmir.