Power panel rejects board’s tariff plea
Rakesh Lohumi
Tribune News Service

Shimla, February 22
In a rebuff to the state electricity board for “persistent non-compliance” of its directions, the state electricity regulatory commission has refused to admit the tariff petition for the year 2010 and directed it to file an affidavit showing the latest status of compliance in respect of directions as well as the updated status on utilisation of capital expenditure.

Expressing anguish and total dissatisfaction over the status of compliance of directions submitted by the board with the petition, the commission reiterated that the tariff approved for the licencee and the directions issued, as contained in the last tariff order, were a quid pro quo and mutually inclusive. The board had been availing the benefits of the approved tariffs without bothering much about complying with the directions contained in the tariff order.

The commission directed that after filing an affidavit the Whole Time Members (WTM) of the board should discuss it with the commission.

Several important directions pertaining to segregation of accounts of generation, transmission and distribution, implementation of public interaction programme, valuation of assets, capital works in progress, debt sustainability, manpower planning, determination of generation tariffs of board’s own projects, energy audit and implementation of AMR, to name a few, were still to be effectively complied with.

Further, the board had slipped badly in the utilisation of the capital investment approved for the MYT (multi-year tariff) period. The commission decided to monitor the information to be submitted by the board on the prescribed formats annexed to the tariff order on a regular basis.

The consumer representative also pointed out that the board had been very casual in complying with the directions over the past several years and it was time it showed some seriousness in implementing the directions issued by the commission.

The board has projected an aggregate revenue requirement (ARR) of Rs 2,872 crore for 2010-11 as against the expenditure of Rs 2,340 crore approved by the commission for the current financial year. The average tariff will shoot up from Rs 3.60 to Rs 4.49 per unit if the ARR is approved as it is. Even if the commission goes by its multi-year tariff scheme, which projects the requirement at Rs 2,750 crore, the tariff will work out to Rs 4.29 per unit.