SHILLONG, Nov 13: The Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited (MeECL) has defended move of signing an MoU with Byrnihat Industrial Association (BIA) for sale of power at Rs 4.90 per unit.
In a statement, the utility asserted that the decision to sell power was to ramp up domestic sales considering the net availability of power, while also sating that the consumers in Meghalaya have the capacity/willingness to consume more power but are not doing so.
“Some are drawing power through open access which becomes unviable when you add cross-subsidy charges while others are compelled to reduce their industrial production due to high cost of power. Moreover, the MeECL is forced to sell its power in the electricity exchange at a rate lesser than Rs 3 per unit and the MSERC has also projected the rate to be Rs 2.86 per unit considering the market rate of power in recent times,” the statement said.
On the decision of choosing BIA, the MeECL said that the Meghalaya State Electricity Regulatory Commission (MSERC), in its tariff order, allowed AT&C at 12 per cent whereas due to different unavoidable reasons the utility is incurring AT&C loss of around 34 per cent. The loss on and above the allowed loss, as approved in the tariff, is not recoverable from the consumers, it added.
The statement added that the loss incurred from sale of power to industrial consumers is lower than 12 per cent, whereas the losses from other consumers are higher.
The increase in industrial consumption will lower the overall AT&C loss, it suggested.
“Some industrial consumers are procuring power from outside the state though Open Access as power is available outside at cheaper rate compared to the MePDCL rate. But if they can be brought under the umbrella of the MePDCL, the industrial and overall domestic sale will increase,” the statement added.
On the agreed rate of Rs 4.9 per unit, the MeECL said that it is more than Rs 2.86 per unit, the rate fixed by the MSERC for sale of surplus power.
The differential amount of Rs 2.04 per unit will reduce the burden of the domestic consumers as it will increase the sale of power, which is supposed to be sold at Rs 2.86 per unit, the statement stated.
It also said that the present average load factor is 22 per cent with the rate for 132 KV consumers being Rs 6.2 per unit and the assured load factor is 68 per cent with rate of Rs 4.90 per unit. “Presently, the excess power is being sold by the MePDCL at Rs 2.86 considering the same the following calculations may be useful,” statement said.
