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Stretching from Assam, near China, to the Himalayas and the northwestern deserts of Rajasthan, the outage covered states where half of India's 1.2 billion people live and embarrassed the government, which has failed to build up enough power capacity to meet soaring demand.
"Even before we could figure out the reason for yesterday's failure, we had more grid failures today," said R. N. Nayak, chairman of the state-run Power Grid Corporation.
And of course, the former energy head was promoted last week...
India's power minister, Sushil Kumar Shinde, was promoted to the post of home minister on Tuesday, while the country is in the midst of an electricity crisis that has left 600 million without power, according to the BBC.
In a statement on Tuesday evening, Shinde said he had appealed to states to stop trying to draw more than their quota of power. He said, "I have also instructed my officials to penalize the states which overdraw from the grid."
Private companies work to provide more power. Government isn't concerned with providing for customers - it seeks to penalize. There's a lesson there. So what if private companies do the work for profit. They provide products or services people want. That's why people get rich. What you have in India is the opposite - a service industry NOT dependent on paying customers, NOT focused on delivering services for profit - therefore hurting the customers is no big deal. Penalize them - no big deal. The people aren't even customers - they are inconveniences.
Here's another lesson.
"If anything, this was a time to give Shinde room to tackle the crisis and even to beef up the resources available to him. His successor will be coming in groping in the dark and it will be probably weeks before he even figures out how grids work, leave alone provide any rudimentary leadership."
They are putting people in leardership who don't know how grids work?? This is what government does. Private companies do not do this if they want to stay in business.
Private companies work to provide more power. Government isn't concerned with providing for customers - it seeks to penalize. There's a lesson there. So what if private companies do the work for profit. They provide products or services people want. That's why people get rich. What you have in India is the opposite - a service industry NOT dependent on paying customers, NOT focused on delivering services for profit - therefore hurting the customers is no big deal. Penalize them - no big deal. The people aren't even customers - they are inconveniences.
Here's another lesson.
Here's the real problem, and part of it is you. Private companies work to acquire maximum numbers of perpetually 'dependent' customers, which is identical to the charge you level at the feet of a sovereign, who IS legitimately tasked with the role of stewardship. One providence undermining the needs of another providence IS an issue, and he rightfully is imposing penalty to keep the peace. You know nothing about their culture first hand, so really, sit down and smell the lotus blossoms floating in a septic pond.
India is attempting to grow after many centuries of 3rd world status, and these growing pains cannot help but be painful. Using the old industrialist blueprint in this modern era is foolish. Even our own grid of largese needs to evolve. The more ideal arrangement of power delivery for the masses is stand alone technologies for rural demands, and net grid tie systems outside highly concentrated urban centers where a large plant servicing their needs is most economical. It makes strategic sense minimizing the attractiveness of terrorist targets by spreading out power generation systems in diffuse manner. This same type regional power outage crippled new england not too long ago, and although the cause wasn't the same, the intrinsic weakness in the system made itself known to all. Same right here in WV just this past month, so don't be talking smack about India when all hail worship 'free market' Appalachian power is delivering the exact same 3rd world results.
Business is still going to be business. There will still be the demands for line maint., power plant operators, and even another industry of stand alone/ net grid tie installation. It just can't be permitted to be the fish in a barrel monopolistic arrangement that systems of largesse cannot help but arrange for themselves when they have no allegiance to the best interest of the masses, but only to their personal accumulation of wealth. A system that isolates trouble in the smallest possible footprint without impeding all others from functioning makes most pragmatic sense.
Today the AP writes: "While the spill of ash from burned coal contains arsenic and potentially carcinogenic heavy metals, it is not regulated as hazardous waste. Some enviromental groups want EPA to change that. TVA owns nearly 3,000 acres of ash ponds at its other coal plants in Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama."
The EPA said it would decide how to regulate coal ash within a year, but it has now pushed back its decision.
Do you think the gov't would take it easy on private companies? Heck no. It would be in the interest of the public to penalize compnaies for harming the public. But for them? No rush. No hurry. No big deal that it impacted people.
Here's the real problem, and part of it is you. Private companies work to acquire maximum numbers of perpetually 'dependent' customers, which is identical to the charge you level at the feet of a sovereign, who IS legitimately tasked with the role of stewardship. One providence undermining the needs of another providence IS an issue, and he rightfully is imposing penalty to keep the peace. You know nothing about their culture first hand, so really, sit down and smell the lotus blossoms floating in a septic pond.
Private companies have customers. You say dependent customers. I say happy customers who are satisfied with the service they are receiving. Believe me - when service is bad, customers will flee if they have the choice.
Sovereign entities do not have customers. Their funds do not come based on the type of service they provide. They put someone in charge who doesn't understand power grids. Culture doesn't matter here.
And the claim about one province undermining another is debated.
Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde blamed the system collapse on some states drawing more than their share of electricity from the over-burdened grid, but Uttar Pradesh's top civil servant for energy said outdated transmission lines were at fault.
The current energy head said they haven't figured out why the grid failed yet.
Sounds like the people are going to be out of luck for awhile - which sucks.
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