Kathmandu. Electricity from the 14.8 MW Upper Sanjen Hydroelectric Project constructed in Rasuwa is connected to the national grid. The trial production has been started since last Saturday from the project completed by Sanjen Hydropower Company.
Sunil Dhungel, the chief executive officer of the company, said that the production units connected to the power house are being tested alternately so that the electricity of the project will go to the national grid. “After the main transmission line was not built on time, we connected it to our project system a few days ago through an alternative transmission line,” he said. Due to the low capacity of the alternative transmission line due to the testing phase, around 6 to 7 megawatts have gone to the project’s power system.
According to him, Dhungel also informed that the continuous 48-hour test is going to start from Wednesday. The company said that commercial production will start from the project only after the trial period is completed.
He said that when the commercial production of the project starts, electricity can flow up to 12 megawatts from the alternative transmission line. At full capacity, the production can be started only after the transmission line up to Chilime Hub Substation is ready.
A transmission agreement has been made that the electricity of the project should be connected to the 220 KV Chilime hub substation. However, since the construction of 220 KV Chilime-Trishuli transmission line has not been completed, it seems that it will take time to connect the electricity of the project to the previously fixed substation. The 5.9 km long transmission line to be built by the project up to Chilime Hub has been completed.
The project, whose construction started in 2012, should have been completed and electricity generation should have already started. However, the project has taken more than a decade to complete due to various factors including earthquake, blockade, covid-19 epidemic, transmission line problems, etc.
During the covid-19 epidemic, electromechanical equipment could not be imported for a long time and the contractor company’s workers and technicians took a long time to return from China.
The 42.5 MW Sanjen project being built by the company is also nearing completion. The company said that it will take at most 2 months to complete this project, but until the transmission line is ready, power generation cannot be started. The electricity of this project will be connected to the Chilime hub substation after the completion of the Chilime-Trishuli transmission line.
Even this project will not be completed later than the target due to earthquake, blockade, covid-19 epidemic, transmission line problem. It is estimated that 724,22,00,000 rupees will be spent to complete both the projects, but it is expected to increase due to the extension of the construction period.
For electricity generation, 11.6 cubic meters of water per second has been delivered to the power house built in Simbu Village. The 1,300 meters underground tunnel and 156 meters penstock pipe have been used to pump water collected at a dam site of Tiluche River, which is situated at an altitude of 2,350 meters above the sea level.
Dhungel said that 88.5 million units of electricity will be produced annually through three Francis turbines and the project is expected to generate an annual income of Rs 400 million.
The power house is constructed at an altitude of 2,180 meters above sea level. With the completion of this project, electricity production from Rasuwa-based power plants has reached 118 MW.
