Managing Director (MD) of Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) Kulman Ghising has stated that the current problem in power supply in the Kathmandu Valley is due to rise of demand at a higher level than that NEA expected.
Holding a press conference on Friday, he pointed that peak demand in the Valley has risen to 500 MW which is 80 MW higher than that during the last winter.
"Our feeder lines and transformers have been overloaded due to the high demand. There are almost 3,800 transformers in the Valley now. There were problems in around 50-60 of them," he stated.
Most of the tranfromers in the Valley currently are of 200kVA capacity. They will be replaced with those of 300kVA capacity after rise in load. "We will have to add more transformers if even replacing with 300kVA does not suffice. Locals do not allow transformers near their residence. That has created problems."
He apologized for irregular power supply in the Valley for the past few days attributing that to a higher rise in demand than the NEA expected. "I won't ask you all to lower consumption. High demand is very good for us," he added. "We have taken this problem as an opportunity. This has given us a lesson on what kind of infrastructure we should develop."
He revealed that infrastructure are already being developed in a way to sustain a demand of over 2,000 MW in the Valley. "We are building substations at nine places in Kathmandu. We are keeping the cables underground. It can take almost one-and-half to two years to make the distribution system reliable in Kathmandu."
