11-hour power rationing to resume in Tanzania

Tanzania's sole electricity supplier has announced that power rationing to last as long as at least 11 hours a day starts on Thursday throughout the country.

A statement issued by the Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited said that electricity consumers would have to go without electricity for almost half a day every day until the end of the year.

The imminent power rationing is declared to be the longest in Tanzania's history.

Lack of rainfalls caused similar long spells of power rationing back in 1994 and the early 1980s, according to Dar es Salaam residents.

But power rationing to last thus long, more than half a year, will be the longest in the east African country, according to one city dweller who preferred to be known only as Mussa.

"Consumers will have their power supply disconnected from 7 in the morning and restored in phases from 6 in the evening from Monday to Sunday," said the statement signed by the power supply company Managing Director, Adriaan van der Merwe.

Tanzania already resorted to power rationing later last year and early this year when water levels at the country's major hydropower reservoirs were too low to help generate electricity.

As of Wednesday, the water level at the country's key hydropower dam of Mtera was 689 meters above sea level, or still one meter below its minimum required level for normal power generation.

The maximum water level at the dam is supposed to be at 698.5 meters above sea level.

Tanzania had been relying on hydropower generation that used to provide 90 percent of the country's electricity consumption.

Yet drought in recent years have forced the Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited to turn to thermo-generated power that is much more expensive.

Now natural gas-fired turbines are generating upwards of 70 percent of the country's electricity consumption.

Electricity tariffs have just been raised on June 1 and local electricity consumers are fearing that the power tariffs will soon have to be raised again in that donors who have been pumping their money into the operation of the Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited have wanted the power tariffs to be increased by between 15 and 20 percent, instead of only 5 percent.

Source: Xinhua