Have an extra holiday, says power-starved Orissa

BHUBANESWAR - Faced with an acute shortage of power, the Orissa government is planning to tell factory and office managements to take off for an extra day every week, an official said Thursday.

There is a severe drop in power production in Orissa mainly due to dip in water level in hydro-power units (reservoirs) following erratic rainfall last year. Though the state is trying to shore up the shortfall by sourcing power from captive power plants of private companies, technical snags have acted as deterrents.

“We used to source power from Sterlite Industries, Vedanta and Bhusan. But all three units have developed technical snags at the same time, hitting power production. Hence, we are not getting the 400-500 MW of power we used to get from them,” a senior official of the state energy department said.

To overcome the problem, the Orissa government is going to ask industries and business houses to have an extra holiday each week, the official said, adding that it would save about 200 MW of power every day.

“We are planning to implement power holiday in industries and big business houses once a week. It would save us electricity. The notification in this regard would be announced soon,” he said.