‘Nkula maintenance works not end to blackouts’
The Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) and the Electricity Generation Company (Egenco) have said the completion of maintenance works at Nkula B Hydro Power Station will not end power blackouts in the country.
Egenco embarked on major maintenance works at Nkula B Hydro Power Plant’s Main Inlet Valve (MIV) and replacement works on Nkula unit number 5 over the Easter holiday.
The maintenance works, which started last Thursday and ended on Tuesday, led to the shut down of Nkula B Hydro Power Station and subsequently extended load shedding hours to 18 hours maximum.
In an interview yesterday, Escom public relations officer George Mituka said electricity users will now be experiencing previous load shedding hours of about six hours which the power supply body implemented before the Easter shutdown.
He said: “Electricity users will now be experiencing less hours of load shedding as compared to the Easter holiday as the corporation has from 4am on Thursday reverted to the previous load shedding schedule of six hours. This is because we now have the 100 megawatts which were not available during the Easter holiday. However, in case others are still experiencing longer hours of power blackouts, let them report to our office for it might be a fault and not load shedding as such.”
But Mituka could not promise a complete end to blackouts, saying that would only depend on the amount of power they get from Escom suppliers.
In a separate interview, Egenco senior public relations officer Moses Gwaza detailed the importance of the maintenance works at the Nkula B MIV saying it is very significant as it will improve the power plant’s reliability as well as the machine’s efficiency.
He said the wornout MIV posed a risk of flooding the whole Nkula B Power Station, thereby putting the country at the risk of losing 100 megawatts (MW) for longer durations.
Gwaza also outlined some of the interventions aimed at improving the power situation, such as the installation of 20MW diesel generators at Mapanga in Blantyre currently underway and 10MW in Lilongwe by end of May.
“The coming in of 36MW of Nkula A by end of August and the addition of 10MW at Tedzani III by end of December are some of the measures that Egenco is pursuing. We are poised to end power shortages in the country in the short to medium term,” he stated.
The Egenco spokesperson added that the K5 billion project of dredging of Tedzani Pond, which will increase water storage capacity for continued generation of power, will assure Tedzani Power Station of longer peak operations even with low Shire River flows.
The MIV works, which involved dismantling and removing the worn out MVI and replacing it with a new one, were the first to be carried out on the machine since its commissioning in 1981.
