Riyaz Bhat
Srinagar, Feb 19: In an awful revelation, authorities have said that Jammu and Kashmir may face 29 percent of ‘forced load shedding’ of annual power in the year 2034-35.
Besides, the authorities have further projected that in the coming ten years, the Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of power demand is likely to increase by more than four percent in Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh.
According to the official documents, authorities in a report have projected that “Electrical energy demand for the UT of J&K and Ladakh is increasing with a CAGR of 4.2 percent from 2024-25 to 2034-35 as forecasted by 20th Electric Power Survey (EPS) of India.”
It has further said that the projections of J&K also indicate that electrical energy demand may increase with a CAGR of 4.07 percent from 2024-25 to 2034-35.
“For satisfying resource adequacy that is meeting the electricity demand reliably and at affordable cost, the UT needs to methodically plan its capacity expansion either by investing or by procuring power,” it reads.
The documents states that in view of the reduction in cost of solar panels and newer technology options like battery energy storage systems, planning for long term optimal generation capacity mix gains tremendous importance so as the future generation capacity mix is cost effective as well as environment friendly.
It further said that a study was carried out considering existing capacity, planned capacity and capacity required to fulfill the Renewable Purchase Obligations (RPO) for the UT.
“It was observed that the total un-served energy in the year 2034-35 is expected to be about 9928 MU which is about 29 percent of annual energy during the year 2034-35,” it reads.
Un-served energy is referred to as the sum of electrical energy demand that cannot be supplied within a region due to a shortage of generation, demand-side participation, or interconnector capacity.
The report further said that in order to find out the least cost option for generation capacity expansion for the period 2024-25 to 2034-35 to meet the demand reliably, long-term study for the UT of J&K and Ladakh was carried with an objective to minimize the total system cost of generation including the cost of anticipated future investments while fulfilling all the technical/financial constraints associated with various power generation technologies.
“Additionally, a reliability study has been carried out to determine the probability of unmet demand and hours by implementing the variation in demand, RE (Solar, Wind) and forced outage of thermal generators (Coal, gas) etc. Thus, the Resource adequacy studies have projected likely optimal capacity mix for future years till 2034-35 which would able to meet anticipated demand reliably at every instance while meeting Renewable Purchase Obligations (RPO),” it reads.
