Heavy silt flows shuts down 1500 MW Jhakri plant in Himachal

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July 27, 2010

By: Ravinder Makhaik

Rampur: Rise in silt levels in the fast flowing Satluj River has forced a shutdown at the country largest hydro-electric generation plant at Jhakri since Monday.

General manager of the plant, NC Bansal said that there has been an increase silt level at Natpha, the intake dam site of the 1500 MW Jhakri plant.

To save plant machinery from corrosive damage because of the high silt levels, the plant was shut down on Monday morning, he added.

Against a permissible silt level of 4000 to 5000 parts per million (ppm), the river flow was said to be carrying silt levels of 11,000 to 14,000.

This year this is the second time that increased silt levels have forced a shut down.

The plant feed the northern grid from which the states and cities of Haryana, Punjab, Chandigarh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Rajasthan and Uttrakhand meet their power consumption needs.

At peak generation, the Jhakri plant generates about 38 million units of power daily which fetch a daily revenue of about Rs 9 crore.

The plant is operated by SJVN, a central sector public sector undertaking in which Himachal Pradesh has an 25.5 % equity shareholding.

Photo Credit: Ravinder Makhaik

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July 27, 2010

One Response to Heavy silt flows shuts down 1500 MW Jhakri plant in Himachal

K.Y. Singh July 27, 2010 at 9:07 pm

The reason for the shut down on Monday was;
The JP group which is constructing 1100 MW Karcham Wangtoo project upstream of NJPC had thrown the debris in Sutlej from its construction dumping sites…
What does it indicate;
The private company can shut down the public sector project at any time, at its will…
This company has made assets worth Rs 19000 crore in Himachal in past few years…including a power project on nearby Baspa River.
The rates of per unit of electricity would go up once its project would be operational…
Keep it up the supporters of privatisation…
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