VIJAYAWADA: There is no power tariff hike for domestic consumers for the consumption of below 500 units for 2020-21 fiscal, but those who consume above 500 units have to shell out more. There is a hike of 90 paise per unit over and above 500 units in all the categories. The increase in the tariff will only affect 1.35 lakh of the 1.45 crore domestic consumers.
Andhra Pradesh Electricity Regulatory Authority (APERC) chairman CV Nagarjuna Reddy, announcing the new power tariffs in Hyderabad on Monday, said for consumption of above 500 units, the tariff has been fixed at Rs 9.95 per unit from the existing Rs 9.05 per unit.
The State government, apart from bearing Rs 8,353.58 crore subsidy burden for agriculture consumers (free power), which is 18 per cent more than the previous year (Rs 7,064.27 crore), has also agreed to bear the subsidy of Rs 1,707 crore for the concessional tariff extended to domestic consumers. It is the first time that the State government has agreed to bear the burden of concessional tariff extended to the domestic consumers. That is, the entire deficit of power distribution companies, which has been calculated at Rs 10,060.63 crore, will be borne by the State government.
The two discoms — APSPDCL and APEPDCL — have projected a deficit of Rs 14,349.07 crore at current tariffs and a deficit of Rs 12,954.11 crore with the proposals of a tariff hike to certain categories of consumers and to RESCOs. However, the Commission has determined the net deficit of Rs 10,060.63 crore, thus avoiding the possible burden of Rs 2,893.48 crore on the consumers.
The proposals of Transco and Discoms to procure power from private power plants who are not having binding agreements was rejected by the Commission in view of the surplus power. Another most important decision was that the domestic grouping based on the current month’s consumption will replace the earlier grouping based on the previous year’s consumption, which will be a big relief to the domestic consumers.
Non-profit organisations, government hospitals and government educational institutions, which were in commercial category, will now be under HT general category, exempting them from the ToD (Time of the Day) peak charges.
To promote usage of environment-friendly electric vehicles, APERC has fixed power tariff for them at Rs 6.7 per unit against the proposed Rs 12.25 per unit. The APERC has rejected the discoms’ proposals to withdraw the benefit of Load Factor Incentive to industries, which was introduced in the current fiscal.
Further, rice millers and pulverisers are given the benefit of billing under LT tariffs up to a connected load of 150 HP against the present limit of a connected load of 100 HP, with certain conditions.
The industry has also extended the benefit of limiting the penalties only to the extent of excess demand over contracted demand, by suitably modifying the penalty condition. Interests of small consumers are protected by reducing the capacitor surcharge from 25 per cent to 10.
The discoms were asked to obtain the permission of the APERC for their investment proposals. Further, they are directed to prepare a roadmap for the implementation of energy conservation.
