PENAMPANG: Some areas in Sabah may continue to experience up to two hour power outages daily at least until July when supply is expected to stabilise.
Sabah Public Works Minister Datuk Ir. Shahelmey Yahya said load shedding or power rationing carried out by the Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd (SESB) is necessary in stabilising the power grid. He said the blistering weather has caused a spike in electrical consumption believed from air conditioning use.
Shahelmey who is also a Deputy Chief Minister III was briefed of the current situation, by SESB CEO Ir. Ts Mohd Yaakob Jaafar at the Sabah load dispatch centre in Bundusan, Friday.
“If gone unchecked, overloading may cause damage to power stations that will take longer than two hours to rectify. The short term fix is running 11 additional mobile generators capable of supplying 4.5 megawatts (MW) and the addition of 17 more (generators) at 8.5MW by next month,” he said.
He said the long term plan is to ultimately boost Sabah’s electrical supply through power plant projects such as the one in Kimanis that was awarded to Ranhill. He said there are hiccups in the gas power plant project capable of generating 100MW and hoped the Sabah Energy Commission could expedite implementation.
“In the long run, we can expect things to only be stabilised by June 2024. This issue needs serious attention because apart from the people, it also affects Sabah’s economical growth. If not rectified immediately it will greatly stunt us,” he said.
Mohd Yaakob said Sabah needs at least a comfortable 20 to 30 per cent reserve margin from the 1,080MW output. However, the margin is now at 11.66 per cent.
“The current supply is enough for domestic and industrial use but we anticipate an annual increase in demand of up to three percent.
“The demand increased during the fasting season in April when temperatures began to rise. Previously, electricity consumption at night was between 800 and 900MW, but after Hari Raya it increased to 1,040MW.
“We lost 60MW to the landslide which hit the Pangi, Tenom Hydrostation last year. I hope the public may bear with us as we are working round the clock to fix the situation,” he said, adding that one MW can roughly power 500 houses.
He stressed that SESB would not cut power to areas in the city, saying the outage on Tuesday which caused public rage was due to an explosion at the SESB high voltage line switch in Karambunai.
Yaakob said the Wednesday outage was caused by damages to an underground cable running between Jalan Meruntum up to the Sipanggil Bridge in Putatan.
“It is unknown if it was caused by sabotage but investigations by an SESB team found no excavation marks,” he said.
The outage affected Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Kota Kinabalu International Airport from 6pm until power was fully restored four hours later.
A woman was even purportedly stuck inside a lift at a popular shopping mall for 30 agonising minutes. Meanwhile, Sabah’s additional supply through a 15 year deal from Sarawak has been pushed to May 2024 due to incomplete transmission lines. He said about 70 per cent of the 300km cable stretch from Long Bunut to Lawas is completed and only 6km remains of a 31km transmission line from Sipitang to Lawas.
