Power Black-Outs in India

Huge power outages occurred on Monday and Tuesday over a gigantic swath of the Asian continent leaving a population of people twice that of the population of the United States without power according to the Associated Press.

Indians, though somewhat accustomed to the occasional blackout, are shocked by the massive quality of this particular power outage. Some Indians express anger and frustration whereas others accept it as a reality in the developing country.

It is certain that an American would be incapable of comprehending the sheer size of the issue in the United States where a black-out involving 10 million and a few states is considered a near-disaster. It is also important to recognize that India is an incredibly different place from the United States. There is a significant number of Indians who live without any sort of power supply at all. For an American who is constantly bombarded by information exchange on electronic devices this may appear to be incredibly unusual.

The cause of the black-out is suspected to be the confluence of unfortunate circumstances including drought conditions, over-use of electricity from agricultural regions of India and increased energy demand due to economic conditions.

India relies primarily upon coal and hydroelectricity for their power needs, but not insignificant numbers of nuclear power plants are providing base power for the country’s infrastructure.