The Umiam dam near Shillong in Meghalaya is on the verge of a shutdown.
Informing this today, Chief Minister Conrad Sangma said that the possible shutdown is due to inadequate rainfall for the past few months.
“Umiam dam is almost at the point of shutdown as the State has not received rainfall to the required level in the past few months and this has been one of the more difficult months in terms of rain for the State,” he said.
Sangma also informed that the State is currently spending Rs 3 crore to purchase power everyday and if the prevailing situation continues for the next hundred days the State will be spending an additional amount of Rs 300 crore just to buy power and maintain the current level of load shedding.
Stating that situation is very complicated, he said, “We are doing our best to ensure that load shedding does not go beyond this. It is not that the government is not doing anything, we are trying our best to ensure that we are able to maintain things as it is now and we need the rains to come.”
Talking about long term measures to address the power shortage in the State, Sangma said, “In the long run, we have to go for other measures and solar mission will be one of those measures. It will take time but as we move forward we are hopeful that in the next two to three years we will see more input from the solar power into the decentralised system of housing of the houses”.
“We are also working very closely with the thermal producing plants because we are keen that now licenses for the mining are being given. We are hopeful we will be able to start the thermal plants also and that may be a long term solution that we may see in the next two to three years to four years time,” he added.
