Grid failure, gas scarcity, dollar crisis cripple power sector  

Grid failure, inadequate amount of gas supply and dollar crisis have  jeopardized the power sector and pushed the country into deep darkness since Tuesday noon.
"We produce 9,603 MW of electricity on Saturday against the demand of more than 12,000 MW, as we were not able to re-start some big power plants including Ghorasal and Meghnaghat, so consumers were experiencing huge load-shedding in week days," Md Shamim Ahsan, Bangladesh Power development Board's spokesman told the Daily Observer on Saturday at 7:00pm.
Although he claimed the demand of electricity on Saturday at 7:00pm was 12,000 MW but Rural Electrification Board, and BPDB's rural consumers are facing frequent power outages, our correspondence reports.
According to the Power Division and BPDB, BPDB officials it is getting less gas against their demand. Petrobangla data said, the supply of natural gas to power plants was 1,120mmcfd against the demand of 1,867mmcfd.    
On the other hand, the IPPs (liquid fuel based) are not operating their plants in full sewing as they failed to procure fuel from open market due to high price.
"We are operating our plants at low load, our account receivable  stands at Tk 16,000 crore, we are producing around 6,000 MW of electricity, unfortunately we could not able to go for full swing right at the moment due to high price of liquid fuel and dollar fluctuation rate," Imran Karim, President of the BIPPA said.
"The authorities now cut power supply in different areas the moment they find it overloaded as part of cautiousness following the October 4  blackout that hit half of the country, due to this interruption has occurred in many times," Md Shamim Hasan of BPDB said.
Official figures show, though the situation has improved to a certain level following the restoration of power supply across the country after a 7-hour national grid failure on October 4, still the power generation could not reach the previous level.  
Officials of both Dhaka Power Distribution Company Ltd (DPDC) and Dhaka Electric Supply Company Ltd (DESCO) said that the power supply situation have deteriorated in recent days and now they have to resort to load shedding for more than 3 hours a day.  
DPDC is managing power supply with 300 MW of less electricity in the daytime and the outage level might go up further at night, said Bikash Dewan, Managing Director of the company.  
However, residents in both DESCO and DPDC areas alleged that they have been experiencing power cuts for 3 to 6 hours a day.
DPDC received 1,100 MW at 7:00am on Saturday against a demand of 1,400 MW while the demand remains between 1,650 and 1,700 MW on a working day, he noted. The situation was almost similar on Friday as well.  
Md Kausar Ameer Ali, Managing Director of DESCO, said that the distribution entity is receiving 750 MW of electricity against a demand for 932 MW with a load shedding of 182 MW.  
The country's total power generation capacity is about 25,500 MW. But as part of austerity measures, the government kept all the diesel-fired plants closed while a good number of plants remained out of operation for a shortage in gas supply.
According to the Power Division, most of the 129 power-producing units in the eastern zone were shut due to the blackout, it gradually comes into operation but all are not, they don't know when they will be able to restore all plants and address the fuel crisis both gas and liquid fuel to avoid load-shedding.