Rampal power plant shut down again due to coal shortage

The first unit of Rampal coal-fired power plant was shut down again due to the coal shortage early today that triggered load shedding across the country.

According to official sources at the Bangladesh-India Friendship Power Company Limited (BIFPCL), the operation of the first unit, having 620 MW capacity, came to a halt at 3:30am as there was no adequate coal available in the stock.

The BIFPCL officials said they have already completed all necessary procedures to import coal from abroad.

"We hope, if everything remains as usual, the plant will resume power generation after the arrival of the imported coal on August 8."

Earlier, the Rampal thermal power plant was shut down five times in seven months after it was commissioned on December 17 last year and the last outage happened on July 16 due to a technical fault at its turbine.

After the repair of the turbine, production resumed on July 20.

As the power production in the first unit of the power plant was shut repeatedly, the experts in the power sector expressed dismay about the start of commercial production of the second unit.

Meanwhile, available statistics show that the country experienced about 1,153 MW of load shedding at 5:00pm today though Dhaka city was out of the scheduled power outage.

The country generated 12,993 MW of electricity in the afternoon against a demand for 14,200 MW, the PGCB officials said.

"Mainly, the rural areas in the country suffered from the power outages," said an official of the PGCB.

He apprehends the gap between power supply and demand may increase during the peak hours.