Power Up

"Knowledge is power." ~ Sir Francis Bacon

This year, Bombay escaped what could have been its worst nightmare in a long time. Already suffering from bad roads, erratic water supply and inefficient public service, citizens of Bombay were facing a new problem, load shedding. Something that was unheard of in living memory. What is load shedding? It is this. Power supply companies cut off power to certain areas at specific times during the week so as to be able to supply to other areas in case of a shortfall in supply. Bombay was already facing a shortfall of 200 MW in its supply and in summer this was going to exceed beyond 400 MW as the temperatures began to soar. Load shedding had never taken place in Bombay in the last 30 years.

Bombay prides itself on the uninterrupted electricity supply it receives. Bombay is insulated from the National grid by a system known as islanding. In other words it has its own grid. This electricity is made available from power stations such as the Tarapur nuclear power station at Trombay. So even as the National grid faces a perennial shortfall, Bombay is supplied electricity round the clock. This is something that has not been done for any other city in India.

With such a system in place, consenting to load shedding would have been a political harakiri for the ruling Democratic Front government in the state. So for now the city has been saved from load shedding with the Union Power Minister, Sushilkumar Shinde agreeing to make available additional power to Bombay to meet its shortfall.

But there are larger issues to look at here. The issue of theft during transmission, is one. Since electricity cannot be stored, it has to be distributed. Many slum pockets have resorted to stealing electricity from the main lines. Many also indulge in meter tampering. Since then they don't have to pay for the extra electricity that they steal they use it indiscriminately. A large populations use ACs and refrigerators at their cooling limits. This draws a lot of electricity. If they understand that they could do with a little less cooling and use fans instead of Air Conditioners, this could save a lot of electricity.

The problem is awareness and compliance with power saving guidelines. Many power distribution companies abroad have issued prepaid electricity cards. This works like any mobile refill card. Only difference is, if you shoot the limit for the month, you have to pay a lot more for the extra power that you might need. Also if you save electricity then you could get discounts too. This will also allow consumers to keep a tab on their electricity usage. More than that this will allow companies to carefully map out consumption patterns. Also they could have advisors on board who could visit high consumption households and help them plan their electricity usage and bring their consumption down, which in turn is also good for the households as less consumption means lower bills and more savings. Companies could also tie up with manufacturers of CFL lights and reduce the cost to the consumers who should be encouraged to switch to CFL lights by creating awareness about how they will ultimately reduce electricity consumption even though they are expensive to buy.

But what about government offices? They are probably the biggest thefts of electricity as they use it as if free electricity is their birthright. Quite a lot of electricity gets wasted because our friendly neighbourhood government servants don't give a fuck to power saving, as part of their usual apathetic ways. So what do we do with them? Issue prepaid cards to government offices too. And make available complete information on their usage to the general public. So people who are asked by the government to save power, can catch the government which itself indulges in power wastage. If they do not comply, citizens can then use the Right to Information Act, 2005 to demand a complete report on how electricity is used and what measures are being adopted to reduce consumption. This will be reflected in the usage report, so citizens can catch them if they supply false information.

And what has this blogger done to save electricity? Well, my folks replaced the two bulbs in my house with CFL lamps. Also I have reduced the time spent on my computer. Earlier I used to leave my computer idle while it downloaded movies, but now I continue those downloads only when I am working on the computer. Also I switch off my monitor whenever I am away from my comp. Also, now I check mails on my cell phone. So I don't have to turn on my comp just to check mails.

I am doing my bit to keep Bombay lit up. You should save power too, no matter where you stay.