The North-Eastern Electric Power Corporation (Neepco) and the West Bengal State Electricity Board (WBSEB) have decided to enter into an agreement for swapping of power.
However, to start with, the Neepco will begin to export power to the WBSEB from Friday. According to a power purchase agreement signed yesterday between the WBSEB secretary Rajeev Dube and the Neepco senior manager, R K Sen, there will be a flow of 50 mw of power during peak hours and 20 mw during off-peak hours.
The power is being priced at Rs 1.63 a unit including the transmission charge of 35 paise. The 1-year agreement is for import of 200 million units by West Bengal.
The power swapping plan will go a long way to balance the poor ratio of thermal-hydel power in the two regions. While in Bengal the ratio is 97:3 in favour of thermal power, Northeast region has an overwhelming presence of hydel power.
The peak hour import of 50 mw from the Neepco will go up gradually with the commissioning of the 75 mw Doyang hydel project in the first week of June, and the 405 mw Ranganadi hydel project in 2001.
