Chennai, After giving the green signal to the Kudankulam nuclear power plant, Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalithaa on Saturday demanded that the entire 2000 MW power to be generated by its two units be given to the state in view of the "severe power shortage." In a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, she said it would be "proper and justifiable that the entire power to be generated from the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Plant is made available to Tamil Nadu." "This is also inevitable as the transmission corridor congestion problem still continues and has also been brought to your notice," she said in the missive coming almost two weeks after the state cabinet gave the nod for the plant. The chief minister pointed out that out of the 2000 MW to be generated by two units in KNPP, Tamil Nadu has been allocated a share of 925 MW only. She recalled she had already made a request of allocation of 1000 MW from Central pool last year against which a "mere 100 MW" was made available to the state which was facing "severe power shortage". "I hope that this request will be positively considered by you. May I also reiterate that we require and deserve this power?" she ...
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Tokyo, A vast majority of Japanese favour the gradual phasing out of nuclear plants but accept that some reactors need to be restarted to secure enough power in the short term, a newspaper poll showed on Sunday. The poll, published in the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper and conducted on the first anniversary of the tsunami-triggered nuclear crisis, comes ahead of decision expected soon by the government on whether to allow the restart of two idled nuclear reactors.. According to the poll by Japan Association for Public Opinion Research, 79.6% of those asked were at least more or less in favour of breaking with nuclear power eventually . But 69% backed the restart of some nuclear reactors to ensure enough power. Just 28% were opposed. Since last year's accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant the country's commercial nuclear power plants have been undergoing safety inspections with just two out of 54 reactors currently online. Japanese business circles fear power shortages could slow an already limping economy , but residents near existing plants are against the early resumption of idled reactors , some filing lawsuits seeking injunctions to block the process. ...
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NEW YORK/VIENNA : The United Nations (UN) on Monday announced that a group of international experts is assessing the radiation damage caused by the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan last year. The group of sixty experts kicked off a week-long meeting in the Austrian capital of Vienna on Monday in order to identity critical gaps in the data which is available, where additional focus is required, and how to ensure the quality and reliability of what the assessment is based on. "We are putting together a jigsaw puzzle, evaluating the exposures of the general public, of workers, and radiation effects, and looking for the missing pieces," said Wolfgang Weiss, Chair of the UN Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR). The power plant was damaged in March 2011 when a massive 9.0-magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami struck to eastern coast of Japan. The disaster knocked out water cooling systems at the plant, contaminating air, water, plants and animals with radioactive plumes dozens of kilometers (miles) from the site. Data is being collected and evaluated from different sources, including Japan, the UN Food and ...
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New Delhi, Defence minister AK Antony on Monday said decision on withdrawal of AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Powers Act) from some districts of Jammu and Kashmir was taken after thorough evaluation of security. "The issue of partial revocation of AFSPA from some districts of J and K was discussed in the United Headquarters (UHQ) meeting held at Jammu on 09.11.2011," Antony said in a written reply in Lok Sabha. "Decisions on matters affecting security are taken after evaluation of the situation on the ground and after detailed consultations among the Central Government, State Governments concerned and the Security Forces," he said. ...
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Ludhiana, February 4 (DNS)- In what could be described as one of the biggest cases of power theft, the enforcement staff of the PSEB caught an industrial unit in Rajpura in the act of stealing massive power through meter- tampering last evening. The power supply of the industrial unit, engaged in wire drawing, was disconnected on the spot and a demand notice has been served for a penalty of Rs 2.06 crore. A case under relevant provisions of the Electricity Act has also been registered against the unit at the Anti-Power Theft police station at Patiala. The Chief Engineer (Enforcement) of the PSEB, HS Randhawa, who personally supervised the entire operation with the assistance of enforcement officials from Khanna and Mohali without intimating local officials of the operations wing, told Doaba Headlines here yesterday that the firm, RK Welds, located on GT Road in Rajpura town has a connected load of 545 KW, categorised in large-scale (LS) supply. "On the basis of a tip-off, a raid was conducted on the industrial unit by a team comprising an Executive Engineer of the enforcement wing from Khanna and another official from Mobile Meter Testing Squad from Mohali. In the course of ...
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Chandigarh, January 29 (Doaba News Service)- Farmers in Punjab are in danger of being charged full tariff for running their tubewells from March. The Punjab State Electricity Regulatory Commission (PSERC) has informed the state government that it will invoke Section 65 of the Electricity Act, 2003, in case the government does not pay the entire subsidy due to the Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) by the first week of March. The government owes the PSEB Rs 1,038 crore as of January 1 this year. Besides this the government has not paid Rs 386 crore due to the PSEB on account of excess interest paid by the board on government loans as well as interest levied on the delayed amount of subsidy for the previous years. The PSERC in a letter to the government recently has made it clear that it will invoke Section 65 of the Electricity Act, 2003, as well as charge penal interest on the delayed amount of subsidy in case the government does not liquidate its entire liability towards subsidy payment to the board by the first week of March. Section 65 of the Electricity Act states that in case subsidy is not paid as directed by the commission, the order of the government for giving ...
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Patiala, January 22 (Doaba News Service)- Power cuts this time is considerably of less duration than the corresponding period last year, with the anti-power theft drive of the Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) going well and reduction in transmission and distribution losses. Even though there has been a hue and cry in the state over power cuts, a comparative data compiled by the board from January 1 to January 17, 2010, shows that the board on an average currently imposes power cuts for 2.48 hours per day, whereas the figures for 2008 winters stood at 3.57 hours per day. The statistics available with us shows that though the demand has witnessed an increase this year but the duration of power cuts has been reduced by 1.09 hours per day. Interestingly, the data shows that there has been a decrease in power supply from various sources this year. On the basis of average shortfall during the past 35 days, as on January 17 this year, the average shortfall of power on daily basis from the board’s hydel generation is 32.68 lakh units, whereas the power availability from Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) sources has gone down by 32.64 lakh units. The dip in power from the ...
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Jalandhar, January 22 (Doaba News Service)- Hold your breath for a while. The Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB), which is in dire fiscal straits, wants a whooping increase of about 51 per cent in the existing tariff across the board for all consumers to meet its aggregate revenue requirement (ARR) for the next fiscal year (2010-11). For the current fiscal year, the increase in the tariff, ordered by the Punjab State Electricity Regulatory Commission (PSERC) was in the range of 10-12 per cent for various categories of consumers to generate a revenue of Rs 759 crore to meet its ARR. The PSEB has pegged a cumulative revenue gap of Rs 6,575 crore in the petition submitted to the PSERC for the next fiscal year and has prayed to the commission to raise the tariff accordingly to realise the amount from the power consumers. The commission has sought objections from the public on the petition. How the commission would deal with such a huge increase in the tariff, it remains to be seen. Already, there is a difference of opinion in the PSEB and the commission over the consumption of power in the farm sector. The commission had last year reduced the projected consumption in the farm ...
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