The Karachi Nuclear Power Plant (KANUPP) has been shut down for at least two weeks for scheduled maintenance, an official from the power plant said.
With KANUPP going offline, some 80 megawatts (MW) supply has been suspended, further increasing the problems of the Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) which is struggling to meet the power demand of the city.
On Monday the peak electricity demand of the city faced by the KESC was 2,366 MW. This was relatively low, as compared to the figures of peak summer season, due to the pre-monsoon shower.
According to a KANUPP official, the nuclear power plant went offline around midnight between Monday and Tuesday. He said that the maintenance schedule was prepared beforehand in view of electricity demand during the upcoming holy month of Ramazan.
Meanwhile, several areas of the city were affected by power failures in the aftermath of intermittent drizzle on Tuesday. A KESC official claimed that only 10 feeders tripped during the rain on Tuesday and were normalised with an hour. The localities of North Karachi, Malir, Shah Faisal Colony, parts of Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Gulistan-e-Jauhar, PECHS Block-2, Shadman Town, Orangi, Old areas, Lyari, PIB Colony, Model Colony, faced prolonged and frequent power failures.
In related developments, the Sindh High Court (SHC) issued notices to the KESC in a contempt application.
The petitioner, Iqbal Kazmi, a representative of Human Rights Commission South Asia, submitted that despite SHC’s order to KESC for announcing the load-shedding schedule, unannounced power outages were still continuing.
He submitted that no proper arrangements were made by the KESC for the upcoming monsoon season, and prayed the court to direct the KESC to make underground arrangement for power supply.
After conducting preliminary hearing of the petition, the SHC issued notice to KESC’s Chief Executive Officer for not complying with the court order and also directed the court office to tag the petition with identical petition regarding unannounced loadshedding.
