Centre to form new power tariff policy

KOLKATA: The Union power ministry is soon set to announce a new power tariff policy.
This policy will lay down the guidelines to be followed by the Electricity Regulatory Commissions of the states in determining power tariff, a senior West Bengal power department official told TNN on Tuesday.
The Centre’s move comes in the wake of increased dissatisfaction of the power utilities over the tariff fixed by the state ERCs.In West Bengal, four of the five power utilities have gone to court against the ruling. Similar moves have been made in several other states as well. The new policy is expected to be announced in a couple of months’ time.
“It shall bring about benchmarking relating to the tariff fixed by the ERCs. This has become necessary as different ERCs follow different ap-proaches in the fixation of tariff,� the official said. The Centre’s decision was conveyed to the state power department during the recent visit of union power secretary RV Shahi to the state. While details of the benchmarks were not clear as yet, departmental officials felt the policy would try to strike some balance between the demands of the utilities and the needs of the consumers. The utilities in the state, for example, objected to the levels of improvement of efficiency that the West Bengal ERC had recommended, which was the basis for the very low tariff increase suggested by the ERC and reduction in tariff in some cases.
It has also been decided that surplus power during the off-peak hours would begin to be evacuated from the Eastern Grid by the end of the year. The Power Grid Corporation is now working on a distribution link between Talcher in Orissa, which forms one of the extremities of the Eastern Grid, with Kolar in Karnataka, which forms part of the northern grid. “Once this is complete, around 1,200 MW of surplus power during the off-peak hours would be exported from the Eastern Grid,� the official said.
The union power secretary emphasised that enhancement of power generation needed to be addressed with greater vigour, to meet the target of power for all by 2012. West Bengal faces an increased problem in this regard, as two of its major generation projects, at Gouripur and Balagarh, are out of contention in the near future.
The 250 MW Gouripur project has been shelved as the environment department has refused to grant any more projects within the Kolkata Metropolitan Area. The CESC has an-nounced that it will not be progressing with its 500 MW Balagarh project for the moment.