Daily power cuts hit 1,000MW as demand soars on heat wave
Staff Correspondent
The country experienced about 1,000-MW of electricity outages on Monday amid soaring demand for electronic air cooling measures spurred by the ongoing heat wave.
According to the National Load Dispatch Centre (NLDC) at the Power Grid Company of Bangladesh (PGCB), the country’s demand was recorded at 15,220 MW at 3pm on Monday, when the load shedding was 996 MW.
On the other hand, the demand forecast for Monday evening was 15,666 MW and supply forecast was 16,200 MW.
According to official sources, maximum burden of the load-shedding was diverted to rural areas, as part of a policy to avert power outages in capital city Dhaka and other large cities. Reports from different areas said the extent of load-shedding is aggravating the plight of the rural people amid the sweltering heat this summer.
Meanwhile, state-owned Petrobangla’s official data shows that the country’s gas production was 3,046 million cubic feet per day (MMCFD) against a demand for 3,760MW.
It shows that a good number of power plants, specifically those using gas as their primary fuel, remained off generation due to gas shortage.
The power plants received a supply of 1349.9 MMCFD gas against their demand for 2316.9 MMCFD, the data shows.
