TDS Desk:

Load shedding has been increasing across the country as power generation from gas-based stations is still below the expected level.

According to official sources, the country had to experience a load shedding of 1,874 MW at 3 pm to meet the demand of 14,750 MW on Monday.

The Power Grid Bangladesh PLC’s official statistics show that the country was generating 12,788 MW at that time.

Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) forecast reveals that load shedding will go up in the evening with the increased demand of 15,900 MW on the day.

Residents of many areas in Dhaka city had to experience power cuts for several spells in the hot weather.

Abdur Rashid, a resident in the city’s Uttara area, informed that his day started with an hour-long load shedding at 11 am.

Similar allegations were found from residents in the city’s Gulshan, Mohammadpur, Malibagh and other areas.

Officials of the BPDB said that they have not been able to generate electricity from their gas-fired power plants due to lack of adequate supply of gas.

The available data of the BPDB shows that 4,169 MW of electricity is not being produced due to unavailable gas supply to a good number of plants.

Petrobangla officials said that despite repeated requests from the government, the Summit Group could not resume operation of its LNG terminal for which the national grid is not able to get 500 million cubic feet of gas per day (MMCFD) from imported supply.

The statistics show that the country produced 2,609.4 MMCFD against a demand of about 4000 MMCFD gas.