BENGALURU: Union Minister for Power Manohar Lal Khattar on Friday directed officials of the state energy department to expedite roll out of smart meters for commercial, industrial and other categories of electricity consumers in a time-bound manner.
Speaking at a meeting here to review the progress in the power sector, Khattar urged the State Government to take steps to reduce annual financial losses incurred by its power utilities and work towards implementing cost-reflective tariffs.
Underlining the importance of timely clearance of dues and subsidies related to government departments, Khattar advised to saturate prepaid smart meters across all government establishments, including local bodies and colonies, by this August. He emphasised the need for a centralised payment mechanism for efficient management of government.
A presentation on the status of power generation, transmission and distribution in Karnataka was made at the meeting attended by Shripad Naik, Union Minister of State for Power and New & Renewable Energy, KJ George, Karnataka Energy Minister, senior officials from state and Union governments and REC Ltd.
Issues such as generation mix, challenges in Right of Way (RoW) for transmission infrastructure, and the need for support in improving distribution infrastructure were discussed.
Khattar said that his visit was to understand ground-level issues and explore new initiatives to strengthen power supply in the state. Stressing the need for resolving RoW issues that impede transmission infrastructure without any delay, he called for adoption of the Union government’s compensation mechanism.