PTC India to sign pacts with 7 firms, 5 states for 1,900MW power by Oct-end

Power trading solutions provider PTC India will sign medium-term power purchase agreements (PPA) for 1,900 MW coal-based power capacities with seven companies and five states by month-end under a pilot scheme, an official said.

After this tender, the company plans another round of 3,000 MW of medium term PPAs to give some relief to stressed power projects as PPAs are required for getting fuel supplies, a Power Ministry official told PTI.

"PTC India had finalised bids of 1,900 MW capacities last month at a tariff of Rs 4.24 per unit including the nominal fixed cost of one paise per unit for supply of power for the medium term of three years," the official said.

 

The seven companies which would ink PPAs are IL&FS Energy for 550 MW, RKM Powergen for 550 MW, SKS Power for 300 MW, MB Power (Madhya Pradesh) Ltd for 175 MW, Jindal India Thermal Power for 175 MW, Jhabua Power Ltd for 100 MW and JP Nilgiri Project for 100 MW.

Five states which would buy power from these plants are Telangana (550 MW), Tamil Nadu (550 MW), Haryana (400MW), Bihar (200MW) and West Bengal (200MW).

IL&FS Energy will supply 550 MW to Tamil Nadu while RKM Powergen will supply 550 MW to Telangana.

Jhabua Power Ltd and JP Nilgiri Project would supply 100 MW each to West Bengal. MB Power (Madhya Pradesh) Ltd will supply will supply 175 MW to Haryana while the SKS Power will supply 300 MW to Haryana as well as Bihar. Jindal India Thermal Power will supply 175 MW to Bihar.

The government had launched a pilot scheme to procure 2,500 MW electricity for three years under medium-term arrangement from commissioned power plants without power purchase agreements earlier this year in April.

Under the scheme there would be no escalation of tariff during the three-year period on any account. The discoms can reduce load up to 55 per cent of agreed capacity.

The scheme provides that if the supply capacity goes down beyond 55 per cent then the differential power would sold in open market and any under-recovery would be charged to the discom. But if that power is sold at a premium, the profit would be divided equally between the discom and the generating firm.

Under this auction, 2,500 MW capacities were put on the block but later imported coal-based capacities of 600 MW backed out. The imported coal-based generators had expressed their inability to match the Rs 4.24 per unit tariff as it was not viable for them in view of higher coal prices in the international market.

The government has been targeting around 17GW coal-based thermal power generation capacity including 5 GW based on imported coal under this initiative.

The official said that PTC India has planned to auction 5GW under the medium term PPAs during this fiscal and thus it would bring another tender of 3GW by March 2019.

The PPAs are required for getting fuel supplies. Some power plants have coal linkages but their fuel supply agreements are not effective in the absence of PPAs. The other which do not have coal linkage can get fuel supplies under SHAKTI scheme after getting PPAs.