Lahore faces load shedding crisis after low power generation

LAHORE: Power supply got a hit in the provincial metropolis on Tuesday following low electricity generation due to squeezed natural gas supplies and other constraints.

Facing high demand of electricity amid hot weather, Lahore Electric Supply Company (Lesco) resorted to carrying out load shedding even more than what the power utility had announced a few days back. Lesco announced up to seven hours of load shedding in the latest load management programme issued for the period from Jun 25 to July 05, 2021.

However, consumers complained that the utility is suspending power supply even in low power losses areas, which, otherwise, have been given exemption from the load shedding. “Power supply in my area was disrupted on several occasions on Tuesday,” said Javed, a resident of Model Town Extension. He said in addition to about half-an-hour cuts in the morning in power supply, there was a whole hour-long suspension from 5:15pm to 6:15pm.

An official admitted that outages in the Lesco area were more than what was announced by the company a couple of days back. He, however, blamed a centralised system run by National Power Control Center (NPCC) for shutting down power directly as imbalance in demand and supply could knockdown national grid.

According to the revised load management programme of Lesco, electricity supply is being shut for two hours in 20-30 per cent losses area. Five hours outages are being carrying out in the feeders having 30-40 per cent losses while seven hour power suspension is being done in 40-60 per cent losses areas.

On the other hand, the independent steel furnace industry is facing loadshedding between 2pm to 6pm daily. There are also complaints of low gas pressure in the City. It has been learnt that gas utility is managing pressure in localities according to the supply.