A Pelton wheel kept at the KDHP (Kanan Deven Hills Plantation Ltd) Tea Museum at Munnar may not immediately catch the attention of visitors. However, it carries one back to an era when hydroelectric power was first generated at Pallivasal under the initiative of the British.
Records say the “company constructed its first hydroelectric powerhouse at Pallivasal in 1900. By 1910, several factories generated their own electricity.” The mini-powerhouse at Pallivasal then had an installed capacity of 200 kW and it was used to work machines inside the tea factory in addition to light up the building.
Though there is lack of evidence over the exact location the wheel was installed, Pallivasal at Chithirapuram had the distinction of hosting the first power station in the State.
In 1933, C.P. Ramaswamy Iyer, Dewan of the erstwhile Travancore, while visiting the tea plantations, took notice of the power generated from the mini-powerhouse and wanted one under the State. It resulted in the realisation of the Pallivasal Hydroelectric Project, said to be the first in the country under State control. The project was completed in 1940.
At Chithirapuram, there is a building with a board ‘Pallivasal Generating Station under the Travancore Electricity Department’. The foundation stone with the mark of conch, the symbol of the royal family of erstwhile Travancore, is also there.
The installed capacity of the Pallivasal power project was 9,000 kW. Electricity was generated by diverting water through a tunnel with a check-dam (headworks dam) across the Muthirapuzha.
With the increase in power generation at Pallivasal, Mattupetty and Kundala dams were constructed to store water.
While the rest of the country did not dream of generating power from water, the erstwhile Travancore kingdom realised it, with the Pelton wheel a vital cog in the evolution of power generation in the State.
