Loadshedding hits record as some areas go without power for 10 hours

Loadshedding has reached a record level across Bangladesh amid shortages of gas and coal and reduced power supplies from India, leaving people struggling in the intense heat.

At 3pm on Sunday, the country faced around 3,671MW of loadshedding, surpassing last week’s peak of 3,500MW, according to the Power Development Board (PDB).

Power demand stood at 16,059MW at the time, while supply was only 12,388MW, according to the Power Grid Company of Bangladesh. Supply increased to around 13,000MW at 5pm, but loadshedding still stood at 2,967MW.

People in many areas, particularly outside Dhaka, have reportedly been without electricity for up to 10 hours a day.

PDB officials said electricity generation has fallen due to shortages of gas and coal, while reduced supplies from India’s Adani power plant have further worsened the situation.

Adani’s supply dropped to 815MW at 5pm on Sunday, against the usual peak-hour supply of around 1,600MW. PDB said Adani attributed the reduction to difficulties in transporting coal amid adverse weather and declining coal stocks.

Power generation has also fallen at several coal-fired plants, including Payra, Matarbari, Rampal and SS Power, due to coal shortages and technical problems.

Gas shortages are putting further pressure on the power sector. Against a daily demand of more than 1 billion cubic feet of gas for power generation, only around 700 million cubic feet is being supplied.

Gas-fired power plants generated 3,589MW at 5pm Sunday against their capacity of around 10,000MW, while oil-fired plants generated about 2,000MW against capacity exceeding 5,000MW.

PDB estimates that gas shortages have reduced power generation by at least 2,000MW, while coal shortages and other problems have cut another 1,000MW.

Meanwhile, gas supply from the country’s two floating LNG terminals remained below normal after a fire at Excelerate Energy’s terminal on July 21.

The terminal resumed partial supply on August 5. At 6pm Sunday, the two floating terminals supplied 757 million cubic feet of gas, compared with the usual 1.1 billion cubic feet.

Officials hope the Excelerate Energy terminal may resume full gas supply after 11pm Monday, although this has not been confirmed. If restored fully, total gas supply could rise to around 2.65 billion cubic feet per day.

SKS