Excessive generation: CEB incurs Rs. 45 m loss per day

by Lalin Fernandopulle

The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB)incurred a loss of Rs. 30 billion last year. The loss per day to the CEB is Rs. 45 million. This is because the need for power is rapidly increasing and this year it has exceeded the normal requirement aggravating the crisis. It is the government's policy to provide power at any cost without interruption, member of the hydro power cluster of the National Council for Economic Development (NCED), Dr. Nishantha Nanayakkara said.

The major factor for the financial loss is the excessive generation cost. According to CEB estimates the need for power doubles every eight years. The CEB has to meet this demand and support the household needs and the industrial development.

The power crisis worsened in 1996. Over 96 percent of the need for power were met by hydro power generation in Mahaweli and Laxapana complexes.

The power requirement this year is very high. The challenge for the government is to provide uninterrupted power and meet the growing demands at the same time, Nanayakkara said.

After the upper Kotmale hydro power project was set up we cannot exploit further major hydro power projects. Some relief could be obtained from renewable energy sources. Though each unit in renewable energy sources is small in capacity the aggregate level could generate approximately 400MW.This could be achieved only if the CEB's technical problems are sorted out.

We cannot entirely exhaust the energy demand from renewable energy sources. Therefore, we had to depend on expensive thermal power to overcome the energy crisis, he said.

Nanayakkara said the option is to depend on nuclear or coal which are the cheapest thermal power sources. Since we did not decide on either for the past 10 years, we had to spend excessively on diesel power.

Though the country is not having a power crisis it has a financial crisis. Since it is the government that bears the burden the people do not feel the pinch. If the burden is passed on to people then they will feel the gravity of the problem. Even the 30 percent of the population who do not have access to electricity will have to face difficulties.

Nanayakkara said, "If someone could propose a cheaper and environmental friendly option the government should take it up as a matter of priority. A solution is to get power from India because it has expressed willingness to do so.

The other is to opt for residual oil (almost like tar) which is the cheapest petroleum product and a by-product of the petroleum refinery. There is a residual oil plant at Sapugaskanda. We can import residual oil from refineries in other countries because it is just piled up.

He stressed the importance of improving the efficiency of the existing thermal power plants by converting it to combine cycle operations at no additional fuel cost.

So far no one has looked into the old Laxapana operation complex for the past 35 years. Major overhauls have to be done to improve the efficiency of operations at the Laxapana complex. He said, "We have to be open minded and look into all avenues without sticking to one technology.

Because we did not consider all these avenues we had to immediately switch on to the coal power plant which is the cheapest of all thermal power plants.

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The decision taken by the government to implement the Norochcholai Coal Power Plant is highly commendable.

Credit should go to President Mahinda Rajapakse for the bold decision taken to solve the power crisis which has been a major issue to the country's development, according to member of the hydro power cluster of the National Council for Economic Development (NCED) Dr. Nishantha Nanayakkara. Though coal power is cheaper the impact on the environment cannot be ignored.

It is the responsibility of the stakeholder to design and construct all power plants (all the components) of the power plant to meet the international standards so that emissions such as flyash will be within acceptable limits. We have to monitor from the outset before the damage is done.

For which we need professional engineers, consultancy firms to design and monitor the entire projects, he said.