ISLAMABAD: A four-member committee, constituted to probe into recent power breakdown that engulfed the south region and certain areas of north region of National Transmission and Dispatch Company’s transmission system, has submitted its findings to the power division.
According to Energy Ministry, the inquiry committee has submitted its findings and declared that power lapse was occurred on 13th October 2022 due to poor standard of work and the use of substandard material on Tower No.26 of K-2 and K-3 nuclear power plants of Karachi during the maintenance work which was done in 2019.
Raising question regarding capacity of the project team and substandard material which was used in 2019 to remove a fault occurred in the transmission system, the inquiry committee also revealed that the connectors used over there were not made for the transmission line while these connectors were used for temporary interconnection after some alteration/changes. Similarly, the project team had used 25 years old miserably poor conductors on Tower No. 26, 26-A and 27 in the year 2019. Moreover, despite the sensitivity of nuclear power plants, regular repair and maintenance were not made as per the defined standards.
After determination of cause behind the blackout, the Energy Ministry is taking immediate action in the light of the inquiry report, said the Ministry of Energy on Wednesday.
On the directives of Power Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan, National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC) had constituted a four-member committee on 13th October 2022 to probe causes behind the power blackout that engulfed the south region and certain areas of north region of NTDC’s transmission system.
According to NTDC’s office order, Muhammad Mustafa, General Manger (Technical) Lahore was made the convener of the inquiry committee while Anwar Ahmed Khan, General Manager (AM) North Lahore, Muhammad Ijaz Khan, Chief Engineer (TSG) North Lahore and Muhammad Zakaria, Chief Engineer (OP) NPCC Islamabad were made as member of this inquiry committee. And, the committee was tasked to submit an inquiry report within four days.
As per Terms of References (ToRs) of the committee, this committee was mandated to determine root cause of the fault and ascertain if the fault(s) leading to the partial blackout/collapse could have been contained. Similarly, the committee was assigned to verify whether the measures (technical & timewise) taken by the concerned departments for protection of the system were adequate while the committee was also asked to review the previous inquiry reports into similar blackout incidents and ascertain whether the recommendations of those reports were adopted and implemented by the concerned departments or otherwise?
Likewise, the committee was authorized to fix the responsibility on the person(s) involved in case any negligence is observed while the committee was also instructed to recommend remedial measures to be taken in order to avoid recurrence of similar events in future. Moreover, the committee was asked to inquire into any other issue related to the incident, not otherwise mentioned in the Terms of References (ToRs), that the committee deems necessary to arrive at a concrete conclusion, said Office order of NTDC dated 13th October, 2022.
Following the major breakdown on October 13, 2022, Minister for Power Division Khurram Dastgir Khan addressed a press conference and said that the government was fully cognizant of the power blackout in Southern parts of the country. He assured the nation that the electricity transmission system would be fully restored by the evening.
Sharing details with media persons, the Power Minister said that the country’s southern parts had witnessed power blackout due to technical faults at two 500 kV transmission lines simultaneously which resulted in the tripping of several power plants. He said fault occurred simultaneously at NK-1 and Jamshroo transmission lines. However, the north of the country remained safe from power outages, he said.
He added that an inquiry team was formed headed by GM Technical NTDC to investigate the matter which would submit its report within four days.
Khurram Dastgir Khan said that the fault occurred at 9.16 a.m. in two 500 kV southern transmission lines NK-1 and Jamshroo which caused power suspension in southern areas of the country including Karachi, Quetta, Hyderabad and Sukkur etc. He said that due to the breakdown a shortfall of 8,000 megwatts emerged and some areas of Multan and Faisalabad also witnessed partial outage.
