Industrial visit to Pakistan’s Tarbela Power Plant

Initially built as a water reservoir, the Tarbela project, one of the world’s largest earth-filled dam, is now producing over 4,000MW electricity for Pakistanis.

Electrical Systems Engineering master’s students from USPCAS-E at UET Peshawar visited the Tarbela Power Plant on July 2, 2019, as part of the industrial visits program. The scholars learned about the construction history of the project and then visited the power station. They visited the control center and got a first-hand look at the turbine and generator functioning at different levels of the powerhouse.

“This visit helped me gain further knowledge of hydropower generation particularly in the area of transformer protection and turbine monitoring at powerhouses,” shares Ms. Bushra, a second-semester student in the master’s program.

“The visit to Tarbela Power Plant was an amazing experience for me. I saw for the first time working of an autotransformer used for the transformation of voltages (either step up or step down) according to load changes in the switchyard. I also saw single windings high-power transformers of 220kv and 500kv. Most interesting for me was seeing the governors installed on generators for the activation of primary reserves,” notes another student, Mr. Azmat.

USPCAS-E arranges industrial visits for scholars to discuss ideas for possible research topics, bridge the gap between theory and practice, and help them learn about real-life industry challenges.