Major power breakdown hits half of Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: Half of Pakistan on Wednesday saw around eight-hour power outage, as a major power breakdown in country’s transmission system occurred in the morning that left the Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and northern areas without power for almost eight hours.

The electricity transmission system which split into North and South due to tripping on Wednesday in the morning resulting in power supply failure to the Punjab and KP areas and it was restored at 5:13pm (after 7:45 hours) with major power generation plants gradually increasing their input in the national grid.

However, after quick response by the federal government, the power was gradually restored in both the provinces.

According to the initial report, the 500KV transmission line Guddu 747-Rahim Yar Khan tripped at 09:28am and at the same time 500KV Guddu-DG Khan transmission line also tripped. As a result, the load increased on 500KV Guddu-Muzaffargarh transmission line from 733MW/72 MVAR to 1559MW/717 MVAR as recorded at 500KV Muzaffargarh end.

At the same time, this line also tripped. This tripping resulted in under frequency on system from 50.18Hz to 48.755Hz within five seconds. Resultantly under frequency schemes came in action and frequency again improved from 48.755Hz to 49.43 Hz. Meanwhile, some other power stations including four Chashma Nuclear Power Plants also tripped perhaps due to frequency fluctuation/jerk and cascade tripping started in the northern part from Guddu to Peshawar. The system went under partial failure from Guddu to Peshawar when frequency decayed down to 45Hz.

The southern part of country from Guddu onward however remained normal during the entire day which includes Sindh and Balochistan areas.

As soon as the partial supply failure was reported, the NTDC ground teams were immediately mobilised to check the high transmission lines.

Power Division also notified an enquiry committee headed by Additional Secretary Waseem Mukhatar to ascertain the causes of tripping, the process of restoration and suggestions for system to avoid such incident in the future. The additional secretary will be assisted by three experts as member of the committee.

It is however important to note that before the tripping, the system was having surplus electricity as compared to the demand therefore the breakdown was purely associated with system fault.

The breakdown exposed once again the vulnerable transmission system despite the fact that over 10,000MW has been injected in the system.

The government’s less attention towards up gradation of transmission and distribution system and eroding the system constraints has now put the government itself in danger zone at a time when only 15 days are left of the incumbent regime. The country is yet to face more hot days in the months to come, but the power system with installed capacity of over 29000MW of electricity with feeble transmission and distribution system seems not in a position to smoothly deliver electricity to end consumers, a senior official privy to the development told The News.

One transmission line of 500KV was not operational in the wake of some technical work owing to which the other line could not pick the load as demand was higher side and got tripped and owing to the cascading effect Pakistan’s nuclear power plants got automatically tripped. This also led to the closure of the Mangla, Tarbela, Ghazi Barotha, Chashma and Jinnah hydropower plants and other thermal power plants. Some sources said that it was DG Khan-Multan transmission line which got tripped and led to the breakdown.

Whenever and wherever system gets tripped, nuclear power plants are the ones which automatically get shutdown and they take time in becoming operational as under SOPs, they ramp up gradually from one MW.

Top sources also said that lack of coordination between Power Division and Ministry of Water Resources, was also one of the reasons in the failure to make Tarbela and Mangla dams operational on time.

Secretary Power Division Yousaf Naseem Khokhar while talking to The News said that the power supply has started which is now being stabilised. However, the breakdown has affected the Punjab and KP and southern part of the country remained unaffected. To a question as to what precisely is the reason of the breakdown, he said he had constituted a fact finding committee headed by Additional Secretary Power Division Waseem Akhtar comprising three system experts. The committee will work on the Terms of Reference (ToRs) which include i) Why the system has failed, ii) How effective efforts were made to restore the system and iii) And finalise the recommendations to avoid such situation in future. The committee will furnish its report to the ministry with two days.

However, Minister for Power Division Sardar Awais Khan on Wednesday informed the National Assembly that various areas of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa including Islamabad witnessed power breakdown due to reported fault in Guddu and Muzaffargarh line. Speaking on a point of self-explanation, the minister said unfortunately the whole north system remained cut off while south was intact. Parts of KP and Punjab including the federal capital experienced power breakdown, he said and adding that power supply to Sindh, Balochistan and Karachi remained intact.

Wapda spokesman said that the power breakdown was not caused because of any fault of any Tarbela power plant. He said Mangla power plants, Ghazi Barotha, Warsak, Jinnah and Chashma hydropower plants have been synchronised and three units of Tarbela have also been operational and the rest will soon come on stream.