The Kaligandaki line is back, and 170 MW starts earning again

The restored Dana–Rahughat link matters to anyone holding hydropower paper because it turns 170 MW of stranded output back into billable supply. Five private projects that route through the Dana substation had generated power for 21 days with nowhere to send it; the Nepal Electricity Authority says that power is now flowing into the national grid again.

Why it matters: run-of-river developers earn on what they deliver, not on what their turbines can produce. With the evacuation line down, every unit generated was a unit unpaid. The fix reopens the revenue tap for the affected projects, even if it is a temporary one.

The corridor's job is to pool electricity from the Kaligandaki and its feeder rivers and move it into the national system. Heavy rain in late September brought the flooding and river erosion that wrecked four towers in Annapurna Rural Municipality of Myagdi. Three came down completely and one was partly damaged, severing the path from the Dana substation to the rest of the grid.

The authority said it energized a single 220kV circuit on Saturday night using an emergency restoration tower, a stopgap structure meant to hold until permanent towers are rebuilt. That reconstruction is under way, and the section returns to full double-circuit service once it is done. The complete line stretches roughly 130 kilometers from Dana to the New Butwal substation in Nawalparasi and is rated to carry up to 1,200 MW.

The listed hydropower names have not moved much around any of this. The sector index closed 16 October at 3,561.87, up 0.52% on the day but down 1.36% over the prior 20 sessions, trailing a market that has ground higher. The outage and its repair have passed without visible pressure in the group.

The reading changes when the permanent towers are finished. Until then the five projects lean on one temporary circuit, and a repeat weather event on the same stretch would cut the 170 MW off again.