By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Oct 17: Power Minister AT Mondol on Tuesday said Meghalaya has not yet been impacted by the increase in the cost of power in the country after the Sikkim disaster on October 4.
The generation of electricity from the hydropower projects on the Teesta River has been disrupted after the flash flood in Sikkim, he said. “The power price has shot up suddenly and it has affected the availability of power in the country,” Mondal said.
“We are managing without any problem so far but we are aware of the situation in the other states,” he said.
The National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) shut down its power stations in Sikkim after the Chungthang dam operated by Sikkim Urja Limited was washed away. The NHPC informed the power exchanges recently that its 510 MW Teesta-V and the 500 MW Teesta-VI projects have been affected by the flood.
Teesta-VI is being executed by the Lanco Teesta Hydropower Limited. The public sector company said it shut down all units of its power station in Sikkim and that it would assess the losses or damages due to the flood after the water level recedes.
Meanwhile, Mondal said the state government cleared Rs 244 crore out of a liability of around Rs 488 crore loan from the NTPC through the Atma Nirbhar Bharat scheme. Another Rs 244 crore coupled with a penalty of Rs 8 crore per month remains to be paid.
“Our dues to the NTPC are quite huge. Other utilities are also there. The exact figure is not with me but it is quite a good amount. We are trying to clear the dues as soon as possible,” he said.
“The dues keep soaring because of the penalty that compounds,” he added.
“Fortunately, we have been able to contain our losses and taken back about 53 megawatts of power given to Uttarakhand earlier. We should be able to take back 35.35 MW given to Tamil Nadu, which will help us during the lean period,” Mondal said.
The focus is on neutralising the dues as soon as possible, he said.
The overall power scenario in the state this year is better than in 2022 and the department is resorting to two-hour load-shedding now, Mondal said.