Power cuts have returned to haunt Bengal. With the mercury touching 40 degrees, long power cuts all over the state and city have left people gasping. True to themselves, the Bengal government, the Indian Railways and Coal India have embarked on a blame game even as the problems mount. To make matters worse, the crisis was coming but no one seems to have been prepared for it.

The state has been falling 1100 mw short of peak demand during the last one week but the government seems to have no solution. ?There will be power cuts and nothing can be done about it,” Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee said when asked if any measures were being taken to tackle the crisis.

According to West Bengal State Electricity Distribution Company Ltd (WBSEDCL) estimates, peak demand in the last one year has gone up by 800 mw ? from 5000 mw in April 2009 to 5800mw in April 2010 ? but the only capacity addition made during this period is CESC?s 250mw Budge Budge unit.

Going by plain math, the 800mw increase in peak demand and the 250mw increase in capacity should have restricted the peak shortfall to 550mw but the peak shortfall is just double because the existing units have touched near last levels of inefficiency.

The power plants under West Bengal Power Development Corporation Ltd (WBPDCL) has an installed capacity of 3610mw and that under CESC 1240mw but WBPDCL sent only 2690 mw to the grid and CESC 1170 mw.

According to CESC officials, the private sector utility purchases an average of 400 mw everyday from WBSEDCL to meet their peak demand of 1600 mw but WBSEDCL during the recent days could not give them more than 180-190mw. But why should WBSEDCL have a gap of 920 mw between its installed capacity and output when there was no major closure of any units? Only one 210mw unit of Kolaghat Thermal Power Station (KTPS) remained non-operational for a day and another 210mw unit of Bakreswar remained closed for a day so far though the power crisis has worsened.

Although MK Dey, chairman WBSEDCL, said that he fails to understand the reason of such a gap, blaming it on shortage and poor quality of coal, WBPDCL officials pointed out that the real problem lies in the plant load factor (PLF). WBPDCL units run at an average PLF of 62% against a national average of 75% and the old units of Kolaghat Thermal Power Station (KTPS) and Bandel Thermal Power Station (BTPS) run at an average PLF of 48%.

For long, there has been talk of the need to close down the smaller units like that of BTPS? (4x60mw) and coal guzzling units of KTPS to make way for new big size units, but the state never went for an ultra mega power project, which according to a top power department official, was a major blunder.

WBPDCL chairman Debasis Sen said the government has now lined up 2x660mw Sagardighi, 1x660mw Bakreswar, 2x660mw or 800mw (not yet decided) 1x250mw Santhaldhi and 2x500mw Sagardighi projects. But no final plan for any of the projects, except Santhaldih, has been made, an official said. The 250mw of Santhaldih might come up in December 2010, he added.

If WBPDCL?s 3610mw of generation CESC?s 1240mw and central sector?s 1000mw of supply would have been steady, than the state would not have faced any power crisis even at a 5800mw of peak demand. But while the old units are failing to generate efficiently, there has been a major drop of power supply to the state from NTPC?s Farakka and Bhutan?s Tala project. Coupled with that was non-availability of coal loaded rakes ? WBPDCL got an average of 11.6 rakes a day against the required 15 rakes a day ? and all these put together aggravated the problem, state power minister Nirupam Sen said.

NTPC is supposed to supply 600 mw to West Bengal but it has been supplying only 400mw from March end. Bhutan?s Tala project is supposed to supply 400mw to the state but it has stopped supplies around the same time, WBSEDCL officials said.