BHUBANESWAR: State-owned bulk supplier of electricity, Grid Corporation of Odisha Limited (GRIDCO) has sought a 24 per cent hike in bulk supply price (BSP) for 2024-25 against the tariff approved by the Odisha Electricity Regulatory Commission (OERC) for the current financial year.
Filing its aggregate revenue requirement (ARR) and BSP applications for the next financial year before the commission, GRIDCO estimated a net revenue requirement of Rs 13,912.4 crore and to recover the cost, the proposed BSP needs to be fixed at 383.66 paise per unit.
Projecting the energy requirement at 36,263 million unit (MU) including transmission loss of three per cent, the state public sector undertaking said it will generate revenue of Rs 12,184 crore at the existing BSP price and face a net revenue deficit of Rs 1,728.32 crore.
OERC has approved bulk energy charge of Rs 3.05 per unit for TPCODL, 335 paise per unit for TPNODL, 390 paise per unit for TPWODL and 210 paise per unit for TPSODL for 2023-24. The average BSP comes to 310 paise per unit. GRIDCO has requested the regulatory commission for 23.76 paise more than the existing BSP of 310 paise per unit and if approved it will have a spiralling impact on the retail and commercial tariff.
Estimating its total outstanding dues on the erstwhile distribution companies of CESU, NESCO, SOUTHCO and WESCO at Rs 6,707.41 crore as on September 30, 2023, GRIDCO said since there is no scope to recover the past dues after vesting of the four companies to Tata Power, a suitable mechanism should be prepared to compensate the past dues.
“The commission is requested to issue suitable directives for collection of arrears by the Tata Power managed distribution companies towards settlement of outstanding dues and also frame suitable mechanism for for the balance amount through regulatory preferably in the next two to three years,” said the applicant.
Expressing concern over disallowance of its annual revenue requirement by the commission since 2015-16, the petitioner said it is compelled to meet the revenue gap from external sources by way of borrowing working capital loan which is hard to get due to GRIDCO’s overexposure.