Power outages islandwide Two days to restore supply CEB

The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) says that it will need at least two more days to restore the electricity supply to all areas hit by power outages owing to the severe weather condition which battered parts of Colombo, its suburbs, the Southern, Central and Uva Provinces since Wednesday night.

General Manager of CEB, A.K. Samarasinghe told Ceylon Today that the public should take extra precaution and avoid exposed power cables that have been uprooted as a result of the severe weather.

He also requested the public to inform CEB of any breakdown in the power supply or damage caused to electricity cables by dialing 1987.

Samarasinghe noted that due to the difficulty in reaching the access roads to the affected areas, the restoration of power could take more time.

However, he assured that CEB will be working to restore power on a 24-hour basis.

He pointed out that even by yesterday (30) evening the electricity supply to areas such as Galle, Matara, Hambantota, Badulla and Nuwara Eliya had not been restored.

“Even at the moment there are several areas where it is raining heavily. Hence, if the rains were to cease we could restore the power supply throughout the country in less than two days. Our workforce is doing their utmost,” Samarasinghe said.

Meanwhile, the CEB took measures to restore power to a transmission line containing 132,000 volts which had been damaged by a fallen tree in Ratmalana during the early hours of yesterday.

As a result, there were power failures in areas such as Ratmalana, Mount Lavinia, Dehiwala and Boralesgamuwa.

Meanwhile, Deputy GM of the CEB, Janaka Aluthge said that due to the heavy rains in the catchment areas, all the hydropower plants were operating at full capacity.

As a result of it, 67.5 per cent of the daily power supply is currently being powered by the hydropower plants with power to Colombo being supplied with thermal plants.

Of the six reservoirs in the upcountry, the current water levels are as follows – Maussakele 85.6, Castlereigh 79.2, Kotmale 78.9, Victoria 64.1, Randenigala 54.2 and Samanalaweva 43.4, respectively.

Aluthge added although only the third phase of the Norochcholai Power Plant is in operation, there would not be any impact on the distribution of electricity as it is functioning at a high capacity.

The second phase of the plant broke down on 7 November while its first phase has been put on hold for maintenance.