More than 77% of the repair and maintenance of thermal power plants is over, director-general of the technical office at the Thermal Power Plants Holding Company said.
“Overhaul starts every year in September and ends in May the following year. This year 583 gas and steam units in 129 power plants will be ready by June to help ensure sustainable supply during peak demand,” ISNA quoted Esmail Namazi as saying.
“Last year (March 2020-2021), 343 million megawatt hours of electricity was produced including thermal, hydroelectric, nuclear and renewables, of which about 92%, more than 314 million megawatt hours, was thermal (gas, steam, and combined cycle),” he added.
This year thermal power plants will have to supply the major share of the electricity because hydroelectric plants cannot operate fully due to the shortage of water in the dams and renewables (solar and wind) still have a meager share of the national electricity production (less than 1,000 MW of the total 86,000 MW).
“Due to low rainfall 34% of the dams feeding hydropower plants are empty -- deficit of 4,000 megawatts -- Mostafa Rajabi Mashhadi, the Energy Ministry spokesman for the power department, said.
Iran registered 126 millimeters of rainfall (208 billion cubic meters of water) between Sept 2020 and March 2021, down more than half compared to same time a year ago.
Dams can hold over 50 bcm of water and so far less than 50% are full. The huge deficit in precipitation has resulted in steep decline in water stored in hydroelectric dams, especially in the capital that has nine hydropower plants with 268 MW installed capacity.
Tehran logged 132 mm of precipitation in March 2020, which fell to 2.3 mm in the current fiscal -- a decline unseen in 50 years.
The shortfall means added pressure on thermal power and possibly outages. Sixty hydroelectric plants in Iran have an annual output of 10,000 gigawatt hours when dams are full.
With the rise in temperature before and during summer, power consumption increases.
Regarding one important reason for the increase in electricity consumption, Rajabi Mashhadi said: “The highest consumption is from cooling devices and the share of split air conditioners is comparatively much higher.”
As a measure to control consumption, offices and companies affiliated to the Energy Ministry are obliged to reduce power use by 50% compared to last year by less use of cooling systems, the official said.
“It is recommended that households refrain from using high energy-consuming appliances during peak hours, which is from 1 to 5 pm, and set their air conditioners to 25 degrees centigrade.”
As per a new Energy Ministry directive, the use of split air conditioners in offices and organizations in Tehran is banned to help ensure stable power supply to homes, business centers and medical units.
