Despite state-owned power utility claiming to have "surplus energy" available, power regulator PSERC today said the state does not have "surplus power" during summer season because of which additional energy is to be purchased to bridge gap between demand and supply.
"In summer, you do not have so much of surplus power. You know three months of paddy season... There is so much demand from the agriculture side," Punjab State Electricity Regulatory Commission chairperson Romila Dubey said here while announcing electricity tariff for 2015-16 today.
She was asked why the regulator had not allowed Time of Day (ToD) tariff for industrial sector from April, instead of offering it from October this year.
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She said that there was no scope for introducing ToD from April as there was demand from domestic, industrial and agriculture sector for paddy sowing.
"Last year, we extended ToD for two months (April and May), the results were not very good and that is why it was allowed from October this year," she said.
Under ToD tariff, the large scale and medium scale industrial sector could avail rebate of Rs 1 per unit for power consuming during off peak hours (10 pm till 6 am).
Notably, Punjab state Power Corporation limited (PSPCL) had projected surplus availability of 15,262 million units throughout the year (2015-16) with estimating total power availability of 66,937 MUs against requirement of 51,676 MUs in a petition filed with PSERC.
PSPCL even estimated surplus availability of energy during crucial months of May (2,099 MUs), June (1,277 MUs), July (758 MUs) and August (393 MUs) when summers are at peak and paddy sowing season is on.
PSPCL, however, had even proposed to buy 3,500 million units of power for meeting increasing demand for energy.
Punjab had seen maximum unrestricted and restricted demand for power at 2,302 lakh units per day on July 6, 2014 and 2,454 LUs a day on July 12 last year.
Notably, last month Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal had said that the state is now all set to have uninterrupted power supply by the end of this year, saying, "Punjab will be a power surplus state."
Among private thermal power plants, two units of Rajpura thermal power plants 2X700 MW had been synchronized while one unit 1X660MW of Talwandi Sabo plant has been put on bar so far.
Remaining 2X660 MW units of Talwandi Sabo plant are likely to be synchronized before the paddy season in 2015-16, PSPCL had said.
