Lahore prepares for four-hour electricity loadshedding

By
Our Correspondent

May 30, 2023

Shopkeepers sit at their shops amid prolonged electricity loadshedding in Karachis Saddar area on Thursday, August 11, 2022. — PPI
Shopkeepers sit at their shops amid prolonged electricity loadshedding in Karachi's Saddar area on Thursday, August 11, 2022. — PPI

  • Lahore faces outages despite decrease in demand for power.
  • 4-hour planned outage will affect Category IV customers.
  • 2, 3-hour outages will impact consumers of Category I/II, III, respectively.

LAHORE: Power outages continue despite a reduction in demand for electricity owing to the city's relatively pleasant weather, as Lahore Electric Supply Company (Lesco) has formally begun four-hour-long loadshedding in the city, The News reported.

There will be outages for two hours a day of one hour each for consumers of Category I and II, according to the latest Load Management Programme, where up to 20% aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses are observed.

Meanwhile, consumers residing in areas in Category III would face three-hour daily outages of one hour each. Similarly, those in Category IV will have to face four hours of planned loadshedding daily.

The demand for electricity has been on the decline for the last several days following the decrease in temperature. However, after temporarily stopping outages in the city, Lesco decided to start planned outages.

The power supply company's present electricity demand stands at 3,800-3,900MW against a supply of 3,400-3,500MW. Its latest load management programme has been based on maximum power demand of 4,026MW.

More worryingly, exemptions for industry from loadshedding have been withdrawn and independent industry feeders will now have to face two-hour of outages daily.

Moreover, contrary to the schedule, people complained that loadshedding continues for up to five hours. 

They added that the menace of unannounced outages had also continued to haunt consumers. A Lesco official however said that minimum outages were being observed and loadshedding was only being carried out on high losses feeders.

There are still zero-hour outages for truly independent industry feeders, while industrial-dominated feeders face up to two hours of load management. Whenever there is improvement in case of ample generation, the power supply continues.