As many as 32 power transmission projects in the country are delayed or are likely to face delays, a fact that experts say has implications for India’s ability to meet demand as climate change fuels longer heatwaves, the Financial Express reported.
According to data from the Union statistics ministry, the Financial Express said that 18 large projects being implemented by the Power Grid Corporation of India that are worth Rs 29,300 crore face delays of 32 months on average.
It added that eight projects Powergrid had bid out and that are worth Rs 8,755 crore in total reported an average delay of a year.
Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi, director-general of the Electric Power Transmission Association and a former bureaucrat, told the Financial Express that the delays would “render new generation capacity ineffective”.
“This would in turn hit the country’s ability to meet peak power demand, particularly in the current scenario where climate change is leading to longer heatwaves,” she was quoted as saying.
This June, a prolonged heat wave affected various regions of India, resulting in over 40 cases of heat stroke and more than 100 fatalities by the time it subsided mid-month.
Power secretary Pankaj Agarwal said earlier this month that peak power demand reached the 250 GW mark in May and “may easily cross 400 GW” by the turn of the next decade.
Demand this year would peak at 260 GW around September, Agarwal was cited as saying by PTI. He also said that demand for the first quarter of this year’s April-March fiscal registered a year-on-year increase of 9% in gigawatt terms.
The Financial Express reported that analysts now believe peak power demand could grow at a compound annual growth rate of 11%.
Apart from project delays, there is also the issue of the adequacy of existing infrastructure. Deloitte India partner Anujesh Dwivedi told the newspaper that most transmission and distribution systems in India were not prepared for the “sharp increase” in adverse weather events.
Anish Mandal, also partner at Deloitte India, said the peak power deficit could climb to as high as 35 GW by 2032.