The Hindu : 'Availability tariff' introduced for southern electricity boards

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jan 05, 2003

National

National

'Availability tariff' introduced for southern electricity boards

By M. Malleswara Rao

HYDERABAD JAN. 4. Electricity utilities/boards in the south have come under the recently introduced "availability tariff'' with effect from January 1.

They now will have to pay more for any overdrawal from the Central grid.

The States where this new tariff is to be implemented now as a penalty are Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and the Union Territory of Pondicherry.

The tariff has already been introduced in the northern States.

The tariff may flare up the yearly balance-sheets of the utilities, but it is felt that it would go a long way in imposing a grid discipline.

The measure has been primarily opted as per the Central guidelines framed by the Central Electricity Authority to prevent States from resorting to overdrawals to meet their respective shortages, especially during peak hours (say 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.), resulting in a chain effect of overloading of the transmission lines and tripping of the generation stations.

There have been such trippings in the past few months, with innocent States paying heavily for the faults done by others.

While the ideal frequency to be maintained as per law on the transmission lines by States being 50.5 cycles per second, the States indulging in overdrawal would have to pay a higher "availability tariff'' to the NTPC plants and other Central stations for such drawal when the frequency is less than this.

In this case, the penalty (availability) tariff goes up to Rs. 4 per unit.

If the drawal is made when the frequency is at the ideal rate or more, the penalty would come down to Rs. 2 per unit, according P. M. K. Gandhi, director (commercial), AP Transco, who is dealing with the matter for Andhra Pradesh.

Meanwhile, as a New Year gift, the Talcher-Kolar high power 400-kv HVDC transmission line constructed by the Powergrid Corporation connecting Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, has become commercially operational.

Power is being transferred from one end to the other through this 1,367-km long line.

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