Power: Planning, Generation, Usage & Potential Savings In Sri Lanka
By Ratnam Nadarajah –February 10, 2017
Ratnam Nadarajah
“And God said, let there be light: and there was light.” ~ Genesis
In recent times power or more to the point lack power to meet peak demand has been a real issue for all concerned. There is a possibility to declare emergency and deployment of armed forces to deal with ongoing effects of drought and power outages.
In a developing country, such as Sri Lanka, power system planning faces enormous challenges and problems as, for example, future load growth in the face of uncertainties, the constraints imposed on investment, the type and availability of fuel for the generating units, the need for consolidating the dispersed electric producers, the isolated regions as a prerequisite for future interconnecting these regions via local and national grids. Also, how an optimal reliability level can be achieved that will guarantee a continuous power flow with at reasonable costs.
Planning for power systems is essentially a projection of how the system should grow over a specific period, given certain assumptions and judgment about the future loads and the size of investment in generating capacity additions and transmission facilities expansion and reinforcements.
Any plan can become technically and economically obsolete over a period. New inventions in electrical utilisation equipment or unforeseen industrial, commercial, or residential projects can change load forecast. Breakthroughs in new generation and transmission technologies, unexpected inflation in equipment or labour costs or change of national income can all mean that system plans may take another direction.
In developing countries, power system planning has become more difficult, but more important to provide the necessary information to enable decision to be made today about many years in the future.
Reliability and uninterrupted generation is one of the most important criteria which must be taken into consideration during all phases of power system planning, design build and operation.
One capacity related reliability index, known as the loss of load expectation (LOLE) method, is presently considered as the most common adopted probabilistic index in system generation expansion planning. This method computes the expected number of days per year on which the available generating capacity is not sufficient to meet all the period of peak load levels.
Broadly, Sri Lanka needs power for domestic use, commercial use and for industrial purposes. Over the years, the domestic consumption has gone up with more appliances consuming more and wider availability of electricity to the far corners of the island. Commercial sector too has grown considerably with big shopping malls and multi-story office spaces with increased air conditioners and computers and support items.
On the industrial scene, too power requirement has gone up considerably with the opening of manufacturing units and other infrastructure developments. With the planned mega projects, such the Port City development-work in progress(Wip), Mega polis, Hambantota Industrial Zone, and many others in the pipeline scale of power requirement far exceeds the current available capacity many folds.
Do our planners have a master plan for power requirement, in the short, medium, and long term? From my perspective and observation, I would safely say there is no such plan(s), comprehensive or otherwise.
Let us consider the power generation in Sri Lanka
Total Electricity Generation Mix- First Half of 2014
CEB Hydro ——- 18.55 %
CEB Thermal-Oil—- 18.52%
CEB Thermal-Coal—- 23.95%
IPP Thermal———— 32.53%
(independent power producers)
Renewable————– 6.45%
(Source: Power Utility Commission of Sri Lanka)
The overall power generating capacity is much higher. For instance, the Hydro power installed capacity was 37%. It means that only 50% of installed Hydro power capacity has produced electricity. Put it simply although the power generating capacity is high at 37% but the actual production is only half of the capacity. This is due to various reasons, the main one being the water levels in the reservoirs being low due to natural causes vis se vis insufficient of rain leading to drought.
