Vijayawada: The TS government on Thursday resumed hydel power generation from Nagarjunasagar project as it is getting huge inflows from upstream projects like Srisailam.
With huge inflow of water from upstream projects like Almatti and Jurala on Krishna River, the Srisailam project is getting inflow of nearly 4.61 lakh cusecs of water and water resources authorities have lifted 10 gates to a height of 15 metres and released 4.29 lakh cusecs downstream.
With this, Nagarjunasagar project getting inflow of 3.26 lakh cusecs and the project is likely to be filled to the brim in three to five days as the water level has reached 547.41 ft against 590 ft full reservoir level (FRL) with current storage of 204.09 tmc ft (65.40 per cent capacity) against gross capacity of 312.05 tmc ft (thousand million cubic feet).
With water level rising in Nagarjunasagar project, the state government has installed a capacity of 815 MWw of power and as it started operation of power units one after another and pressed into service six units discharging huge quantities of water used for power generation to downstream the river. With huge inflow of such water into Pulichintala project, its authorities asked the government not to release such a huge quantity of water as they are already having full capacity water storage.
At this, the TS government stopped two power units and is continuing power generation only from four units.
Pulichintala project has current storage of water at 43.23 tmcft (94.45 per cent of capacity) against the gross capacity at FRL of 45.77 tmcft with inflow of 12,934 cusecs and outflow of 13,800 cusecs.
Pulichintala project superintending engineer J. Ramesh Babu said “We have asked authorities to reduce the quantum of discharge of water used for power generation at Nagarjunasagar project as we are getting huge inflows at Pulichintala and we may have to release surplus water into the sea as water level in our project is almost at the brim.”
On the other hand, AP’s hydel power generation at Nagarjunasagar project is linked to release of water into canals and as per plan, drinking water is to be released from August 15 and water for cultivation of crops from September 15 and nearly 20 tmcft of water is required for drinking purpose and 160 tmcft of water is required for cultivation of crops against the allocation of 132 tmcft of water.
Nagarjunasagar project superintending engineer Ch. Purushottama Ganga Raju said, “With good inflow of water, we are expecting the Nagarjunasagar dam to get filled up to brim in four to five days. Once it is filled, we will go as per the directions of senior officials.”
With the latest addition of Nagarjunasagar project for hydel power generation, the TS government has resumed power generation from three projects including Srisailam, Nagarjunasagar and Pulichintala while AP started power generation from Srisailam project recently.
