Darkness wraps Derik market as a result of power cuts for long hours in the winter
Malikiya / Derik – North-Press Agency
Solnar Muhammad
The decrease in electricity hours has impacted negatively on the population in northeastern Syria in general, and the commercial market in Malikiya / Derik city in particular.
Luqman Jalaluddin, a meat seller, told North-Press that the power outage has interrupted his work, as the cleaning and slicing machines for chickens and meat preservation are all running on electricity. He said that he relied on electric generators to complete his work when the power was cut off, calling on the relevant authorities to "increase the hours of electricity."
While the owner of a building materials laboratory in Malikiya countryside, Lound Othman, said that the random and irregular power failure has affected the production of the factory, as he was forced to reduce the number of workers to 50 after they were 100 workers. Othman called on the responsible authorities to take his work and the livelihood of workers into consideration.
In turn, Mahmoud Mahmoud, the manager of al-Suwaydiya power station which supply Malikiya and al-Qahtaniya with electricity, said: "A failure in the sixth turbine and poor wires, in addition to the irrationalized consumption of electricity by the population, led to a decrease in the quantities of energy that it produces." Mahmoud added that new spare parts were needed for the sixth turbine, pointing out that it was previously producing 21 MW per day, and it has now declined to 10 MW.
Moreover, Mahmoud said that the total production capacity of the power station ranges between 1500 to 1600 MW per day, adding that this amount cannot be increased at the present time, because the working hours of the turbines have exceeded the allowable limit.
A number of oil and gas wells are distributed in Malikiya city which rely on turbines to generate electricity for producing energy, the most important of which are Rumailan and al-Suwaydiya stations.
It is noteworthy that the Turkish attacks on north and eastern regions of Syria and their control over the cities of Tal Abyad (Gre-Spi) and Ras al-Ain (Sere-Kaniye), in addition to the increase of their attacks on the areas of Tal Tamr, Ein Issa and M4 highway, have negatively affected the living services, where electricity was randomly cut off in many areas in north and eastern Syria regions.