Kyrgyzstan on Verge of Energy Crisis – PM

BISHKEK. July 31 (Interfax) – Kyrgyzstan is on the brink of a total power outage, Prime Minister Igor Chudinov said at the meeting of the government on Thursday.

“I feel that we are about to have a total power outage,” he said.

“That must not happen, especially at plants,” he said.

Energy executives said it was necessary “to save 600 megawatt of electricity during the upcoming heating season in order to keep plants running.”

It is planned to suspend electricity supplies to private houses and to make school vacations longer.

“Thereby, we will avoid the disconnection of plants and the possible decrease of the economic growth,” a representative of Power Plants company said.

As of July 29, experts estimated the amount of water in the Toktogul dam reservoir at 9.2 billion cubic meters. An average water inflow into the dam lake is 509 cubic meters per second, and the outflow is 392 cubic meters. The dam lake received 5.25 billion cubic meters of water in the first six months of the year, and 7.41 billion cubic meters were used by power plants. Power plants consumed 2.16 billion cubic meters of dam lake reserves.

The republic has had rolling power outages throughout 2008.

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