With three decades of experience in the power sector, T. Jagath Reddy has worked across several domains, spanning procurement, projects, planning, and operations and maintenance of substations and lines, with companies such as APSEB, APTRANSCO and APCPDCL. He is currently director, transmission, Transmission Corporation of Telangana Limited (TSTRANSCO), one of the largest state transmission utilities in the country. He took over this position in 2014.
On TSTRANSCO’s growth trajectory, he says that the company has built a reliable and excellent network of substations and transmission lines. Due to this network expansion, the company’s transmission losses have reduced from 4.3 per cent in 2014-15 to 2.55 per cent as of October 2020, and transmission availability stood at 99.98 per cent in 2019-20, amongst the highest in the country.
One of the transco’s major achievements is that it built a network that ensured nine hours of daytime agricultural supply, which was successfully scaled up to 24 hours in 2018, Reddy notes. To achieve this, the company added 5,141 MVA of capacity at the 132/33 kV level, 2,760 MVA at the 220/132 kV level and 945 MVA at the 400/220 kV level through 144 new power transformers and 91 existing power transformers, within a span of 10 months, along with the required transmission line addition. This entire work was completed within the time limit prescribed by the state government, and clearly stands out for Reddy as his most memorable assignment yet.
Going ahead, TSTRANSCO plans to strengthen the old network in Hyderabad city and in the state by 2040, Reddy says. Also, currently, about 90 per cent of the 220 kV network and 80 per cent of the 132 kV network had N-1 contingency. TSTRANSCO plans to develop N-1 contingency at all EHT levels to ensure 100 per cent transmission availability.
On his work style, Reddy says, “My strong points have been a thorough knowledge of the state and the national grid, and regular field visits. This has helped expedite project implementation and resulted in savings of millions.”
Reddy is an electrical engineer with an M.Tech. in power systems. He has recently applied for a Ph.D. programme at the Osmania University, Hyderabad, for further research in network expansion, particularly in Telangana. He hopes to some day write a book on future network expansion in Telangana, which could serve as a guide for young engineers.