UDAIPUR / PALATANA, April 24 (TIWN): April end brings acute power shortage for the people of Tripura as OTPC's scheduled shut down in both units of Palatana started from 23rd Aprill. Shut down in Unit-I commenced from 17th of April and it will continue upto 24th of this month. This shut down is said to be a scheduled one as there are some maintenance works to be done in Unti-I and it is mandatory to be done after some intervals, said an OTPC engineer over phone on Saturday morning. He said that plant needs some maintenance after a long gap and this is exactly what is going on. On 24th April the maintenance work is likely to be completed. However, on 23rd April complete shut down has taken in both units- Unit-I and Unit- II. It is expected that by midnight of 24th April Unit-I will resume its generation . Unit-II is going for 7 days shut down from 23rd April . UNIT-II will go for shut down because of Performance Guarantee Test by BHEL.

Last time OTPC could not complete the Performance Guarantee Test, said an OTPC engineer.

Thus, it is clear that in the scorching heat of April  the state will suffer from acute power crisis. 

At present Tripura's pick hour power demand is around 260MW while Tripura's internal production is around 90 MW ( 27MWfrom Baramura, 59 from Rukhia, 3 from Damboor hydal plant) . As of now Tripura is having a shortage of around 170MW . To cope with the situation TSECL is purchasing power from outside the state.

Speaking to TIWN TSECL CMD S. K . Roy assured on Wednesday ," Shutdown in Palatana has already started and we too are coping with the situation buying power from outside. There will be no problem during the complete shutdown of OTPC . "

But CMDs claim proved a false statement as throughout Friday, part of Saturday Tripura witnessed acute power crisis with the shut down of OTPC.

It is expected that this problem may continue for a day or two.

Speaking to TIWN on Friday an OTPC official said ," OTPC will resume its fullfledged generation from next week after the completion of Performance Guarantee Test of the Unit -II is completed.

Generally after 10000 hours of operation plant needs to go through Performance Guarantee Test. And it takes 7 to 8 days usually to complete PGT. "