ISLAMABAD – Federal Minister for Energy (Power Division) Omar Ayub Khan has said that system had stabilised following nationwide power blackout on Saturday night and inquiry will be made to investigate cause of tripping.
Addressing a press conference along with Minister for Information and Broadcasting Syed Shibli Faraz, the minister said initial fault occurred at Guddu Power Station at 11:41pm, however location of the fault had yet to be determined.
Omar Ayub said that the fault resulted in dropping the frequency to zero and within a second, causing a cascading effect and all power houses tripped, one after the other.
In reply to a query, the minister said that new installed anti-fog system had worked and the system had shut down itself after the fault was occurred in one power station. However, the minister said that it was yet to be determined where the fault occurred. He said that towers near Guddu are being inspected and the heavy insulators installed there are being examined.
He said the fault caused the country’s high transmission lines to trip, which in turn caused the system frequency to drop from 50 Hertz to 0 Hertz in less than a second.
Soon after developing the fault, the safety system started work to shutting down the power plants which resulted in 10,300 MW out of the system, he said.
He said from North to South, Tarbela and Mangla power stations witnessed shut down. However, he said it took few hours to restore the system back and so far most parts of the country have already been energized.
Omar Ayub said that technical teams were sent to identify location of the fault but were facing problems due to dense fog.
Once again blaming the past government, Omar Ayub said that no investment was made on up-gradation of transmission lines in past and therefore there was frequent breakdowns. As many as eight major outages occurred since 2013 during the tenure of PML-N government.
The incumbent government has invested over Rs 49 billion on up-gradation of the transmission lines in last 2 years, he added.
Earlier, the transmission system could carry 18,500 MW electricity but the huge investment in last two years has enabled the transmission lines to transmit over 23,000 MW in the past summer, the minsiter added.
He said anti-fog conductors were installed, besides washing of the transmission lines which had reduced chances of tripping. As a result no breakdown was reported during the last two and half years owing to the steps taken for up-gradation of the transmission system, the minister added.
Omar Ayub said that Lahore to Mitari Transmission Line costing $ 1.6 billion would be ready in March or April this year. Investment was also being carried out on up-gradation of 220 KV and 132 KV transmission lines across the country, he added.
Responding to a question, the minister said sudden frequency variation caused tripping of the system. Anti-fog insulators were installed on transmission system during the last two years, he added.
To another query, he said the system had stabilised and inquiry would be ordered to investigate the cause of tripping.
When asked why it’s taking too long to restore the system as compared to the previous ones, the minister said that the early breakdowns were partial and it had affected only some parts of the country. In May 2018 there was partial breakdown and it was restored in around 9 hours, he said, adding, that this time the entire country was affected.
Meanwhile, National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC) spokesman said Sunday that electricity supply had been restored completely across Pakistan after the Company rectified the fault on main transmission system.
Most of the cities of Pakistan were plunged into darkness due to a sudden fault in the NTDC system minutes before midnight Saturday, he mentioned. The spokesman added that now electricity is being supplied allover Pakistan as all the 500 kV and 220 kV grid stations and transmission lines of the country are transmitting power properly.
Now the power supply to Karachi has been restored through 500kV Jamshoro-NKI transmission line, he said. While, Guddu Power Station is also supplying electricity to Dera Ghazi Khan, Muzaffargarh and Rahim Yar Khan.
In an earlier media updates, the NTDC spokesman said that soon after the system collapsed, the NTDC officers, officials and field teams started joint efforts on war footings to locate the fault on high voltage intercity power transmission lines and restored electricity supply in the affected areas as early as possible. He added that initially, power supply to Islamabad was restored and then rest of the cities were re-energized in phases. The power supply from various grid stations including 500 kV Rawat Grid Station and 220 kV grid stations at Burhan, Sungjani and Mardan were restored initially, due to which most of the affected cities reconnected with NTDC transmission system. These cities, he mentioned, were Islamabad/Rawalpindi, Lahore, Peshawar, Jhelum, Gujrat, Sargodha, Sialkot, Gujranwala, Sheikhupura, Faisalabad, Okara, Sahiwal, Multan, Rahim Yar Khan, Bahawalpur, Dherki/Ghotki, Guddu, Rohri/Sukkur, Shikarpur, Dera Murad Jamali, Sibbi and Quetta by mid day.
He said, the NTDC Managing Director Dr. Khawaja Riffat Hassan had monitored the entire power supply restoration process from Lahore Data Centre of the company since the fault occurred last night. Meanwhile, the MD appreciated General Manager NPCC (National Power Control Centre), the company’s GMs for North and South, and the field staff for their hectic efforts to restore power supply across the country.
In a related development, the government has suspended seven employees of Guddu Power Plant on account of negligence resulting in nationwide power blackout.
Employees working under Plant Manager-Ill are hereby placed under suspension with immediate effect and until further orders, on account of negligence which used electricity failure found in view of preliminary enquiry, which amounts to misconduct in accordance with Efficiency and Discipline (E&D) Rules 1878, said a notification issued by Central Power Generation Company Limited.
The employees who are suspended include Additional Plant Manager ARE Operation /Shift, Suhail Ahmed, Junior Engineer/ Engineer Shift Engineer, Deedar Ali Channa, Foreman, Ali Hassan Golo, Operations Ayyaz Hussain Dahar and Saeed Ahmed and attendants Siraj Ahmed Memon and Ilyas Ahmed.
During suspension period, the suspended officials will mark their attendance at main gate No 07 of Power House under Deputy Manager (Security), CPGCL.
Interestingly not a single word was issued by NEPRA, which seems active when such power breakdowns occur in KE domain.
An official of the NEPRA told The Nation on condition of anonymity that on Monday the regulator was likely to ponder over the matter and might take action.
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