Electricity for all households by 2012

Uditha KUMARASINGHE

The Government through the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) has planned to provide electricity connections to all households by 2012.

Action has been taken to increase the electricity generation capacity substantially through least cost power generation options to achieve this target.

Measures will also be taken to improve the distribution network and upgrade the outdated control and protection systems to ensure a reliable and high quality electricity supply, a Power and Energy Ministry spokesman told the Daily News yesterday.

Nearly 4.2 million households have been connected to the main grid electricity supply so far.

This indicates the Government has provided electricity connections to around 85 percent of the total number of households now, he said.

According to the spokesman only 70 percent of total households had been provided electricity by the end of year 2005. The Government has been able to increase this percentage to 85 percent during the past four years.

Therefore, the CEB would be definitely able to reach its target of providing electricity to 100 percent of total households by year 2012 under its action plan.

Statistics reveal that except the North and East provinces, electricity connections have been given to 95 per cent of households in other areas of the country. The provision of electricity connections to the North and East areas were suspended over the past several years due to LTTE terrorist activities.

Arrangements have been made by the CEB to provide electricity connections to all households in these five districts of the Northern Province within the next three years, he said. The country's total electricity generation at present is 2400 Megawatts. Around 3000 Megawatts of electricity generation is expected to be added to the National Grid within the next six years. The Ministry has planned to add 550 MW of electricity to the National Grid by the end of next year.