Committee appointed to probe unexplained power cut

by Ifham Nizam

It took the Ceylon Electricity Board nearly six hours to connect power stations to the national grid, yesterday, following a countrywide power failure.

Minister of Power Dullas Allahaperuma has appointed a special committee to look into the countrywide power failure, which occurred at around 12.30 pm yesterday. Meanwhile the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) too asked the CEB to submit a report on the initial investigations into the power failure and the restoration process on or before 20 August 2020. The PUSCL also asked the CEB for a detailed report on the incident and actions taken to avoid similar failures in the future on or before 17 September 2020.

The CEB engineers said that they were unable to use the Norochcholai Power Plant Complex’s, three 300 MW power plants, and it would take three to four days to restart them.

When contacted, Ministry of Power Spokesman, Sulakashana Jayawardena told The Island that a disruption to the power supply had been caused by technical issues at the Kerawalapitiya Grid sub-station.

Water supply in certain areas too was disrupted during the power outage.