Indian Power Sector

10/06/2021

06/06/2021

08/06/2018

CAN DISCOMS BE IN GOOD HEALTH if outstanding electricity dues are waived off. MP Govt has done it for 80 Lak families. It will cost the state appx Rs 5000 crores, half of which will be borne by Discom. It is going to affect financial health of State Utility already reeling under losses and burdened by loans. How can Discom buy spot power to meet demand shortfall? It will lead to poor quality of power supply with frequent tripping, causing discomfort to large middle class population who are paying for their electricity. It is not MP alone. All states adopt this near election time. Is it a right practice? Shouldn’t for sake of cheap popularity State Govt stop waiving electricity bills nor grant huge subsidy to a section of society.

24/05/2018

Why Spot Power Prices at all time high? India's spot price rockets to 5 year high of Rs 11.41 per unit. Is it due to Coal Supply stoppage to CPPs even when thermal plants are operating at 50% capacity. Your participation is important to impress that sustainability won't be possible if thermal power is neglected. Share your views.

01/05/2018

POWER FULL INDIA; REALLY? A proud moment indeed for India to achieve 100% electrification with electricity being made available to all its 6,49,867 villages. A village is termed Electrified if it get a minimum 16KVA transformer, 10% houses get power connection and electricity access given to School, Gram Panchayat office, Health Centre, Dalit Basti and Community Centre. It is a major achievement and has to be applauded as in last 15 years on an average 10,000 villages were electrified annually. It was a massive project, given challenges like remote and inaccessible villages. Now important task is to ensure availability of power in all villages if not 24x7 at least during night time to ensure safety & study of children during night. Per capita Electricity consumption will also grow from a very low 1000 Kwh. Planners shouldn’t worry too much about 100% households getting power. If power is continuously available balance 3.14 crore households will also demand power connection, not to be left behind in race of social equality.

04/04/2018

FINALLY SUN WILL SHINE ON THERMAL POWER THIS SUMMER! Met Department has come to the rescue of Thermal Power. This summer is going to be a scorching one. With ACs working overtime demand for power is going to be huge. And Thermal Power Plants can breathe a sigh of relief. To meet demand in this summer for power, Discoms are already on buying spree. Short term purchases for April-June summer months is touching all time high of Rs 8 per unit. It is after many years this kind of price is being offered, as last several summers saw price band of Rs2-3 per unit. It was long time back in 2009 summers that power was sold for Rs 10 per unit. Power Plants are going to rake money while sun shines provided there is enough coal to keep boilers steaming. Happy days are here again for all associated with Thermal Power.

28/03/2018

SOLAR PANELS & BIS! After installing over 20 GW solar equipment, 10GW in 2017-18 alone, suddenly Ministry realises that supplies may be inferior products. As per Quality Control Order 2017 all manufacturers must register themselves with BIS before 1st July 2018. However, as this will take time wef 1st April 2018 till 30th June 2018 all Suppliers and Developers will have to give self-certification that their equipment is BSI compliant. What is the trigger? Are there complaints that Developers, who are all reputed big names of Industry, are short charging and buying inferior products or being cheated by suppliers (mostly from China) as quality control norms may not have been activated by Developers who are investing Billions of Dollar on Projects they shall be required to operate for next 20 years or so. Or is it a step in throttling imports to “Make in India” really happen? And do we have enough Labs to be able to register vendors after stringent testing of their equipment. This is surely going to slow down imports and targets for years to come.

14/03/2018

FATE OF THERMAL POWER IN INDIA? With full attention being paid to Solar Power there is meteoric growth in the Sector. In 2017 a record funding of US$ 10 Billion has been received by Indian Solar Power developers. Installed Capacity in February 2018 is 20 GW, an eight fold increase in last three years. Average price of solar power is comparable with Thermal power, if not lower. This leaves Thermal Power Sector in a great dilemma. Installed manufacturing capacity of 20GW per annum set up at great cost is almost idle. We invited all big names to invest in setting up manufacturing plants in India at greAT cost. There's so much skilled manpower looking at gloomy future. True Green Energy is the need of day to meet climate warming challenges. But what will happen to huge installed Thermal Power Plants Capacity almost all operating at part load. With almost nil investments in this sector what will happen to aging plants? Who will supply backup power in the nights. Unlike developed countries India can't afford to setup huge battery banks for power backup. Won't it be prudent to not neglect Thermal Sector totally but strike a balance with Solar Energy which shall be 100 GW by 2022.

05/02/2018

SUN IS REALLY SHINING ON SOLAR SECTOR! Year 2017 was landmark for Solar Energy. Total installed capacity shot up to 20 GW, an addition of over 9.5GW during the year, nearly 45% of installed capacity. Tariff also nosedived to Rs 2.44/Kwh matching Thermal power and tempting many a Discoms (Andhra, UP) to seek renegotiation of already agreed PPAs. It is an outright breach of sovereign guarantees but such are the ways of working. There are still more problems for Developers. Buckling under pressure from domestic solar panel manufacturers Import Duty has been hiked. It can result in delay of Projects already signed as developers have yet to bring the equipment from China. Tariff in new Project shall also go up correspondingly. These can have negative impact and slow down the growth in coming years. But the fact remains that importance of solar energy has been realised and it will be growth engine of power sector in coming years. There will be no looking back. A little slow down maybe.

04/12/2017

ELON MUSK HAS BUILT 100MW STORAGE BATTERY IN 60 DAYS INSTEAD OF 100 DAYS PROMISED. Elon Musk is known to accept daring challenges and successfully accomplish them. Even his ardent admirers were sceptical when Musk bid for $50 Million 100 MWHr storage battery for South Australia Power Company to be built in 100 days. If unable to complete in time he offered to give it to Power Company for free. Starting on 30th September the Storage Pack was connected to grid on 30th Nov 2017 in just 60days instead of 100 days as per order. Tesla took this challenge to bag the order and did it in time. It is a big Project Management feat including selecting Samsung as vendor for batteries in place of their regular Panasonic to meet the delivery. This is just the beginning. Much bigger Power Packs are in offing in 2018. A Solar revolution is indeed in making.

09/11/2017

ALL QUITE ON POWER FRONT: Observers of India Power Sector must be feeling absence of news on various projects specially Solar Power. From ambitious target of 100GW by 2022, till September 2017 only 14700 MW has been installed. It is impressive four times growth since 2014 when only 2650 MW were installed. But the growth rate and annual capacity addition seems to have slowed down or become static. During six months of 2017-18 capacity addition is 2400 MW. During 2016-17, 5300 MW were installed. Reason for lack of interest seems to be low tariff during the latest bids and state utilities desire to revise their earlier PPAs to newer & lower rates, which has slowed down the process of implementation and discouraged the developers. At this rate even if we add another 2600 MW in balance period installed capacity in March 2018 shall be around 17300 MW leaving over 82,700 MW to be added in balance four years to meet 2022 target of 100,000 MW nearly 20000 MW each year. Realistic figure could be close to 40,000 to 45,000 MW of Solar Power in March 2022, which shall still be significant addition and about 10-12% of installed capacity, up from present 4.5%. To ensure higher growth Policy Makers must insist for States to honour PPAs which are Sovereign Agreements and any reneging on these erode confidence of Developers in Policies of the country. Power Sector Growth alone can assure overall Growth in the Country

03/11/2017

UNCHAHAR ACCIDENT, A TRAGEDY. It is an accident with a few parallel in terms of lives lost, number of burn victims and visibility across media. NTPC has flawless track record of not only bringing up projects in time, setting up new benchmarks in Project completion schedules but also in O&M. As the biggest power plant operator NTPC has always extracted the best from its units with highest plant efficiency. It was possible only because of highly trained & dedicated executives with a world class management to support them. Not only NTPC engineers but experts in Power Sector will eagerly await outcome of report that shall not only spell out various possible reasons but also steps for future guidance. Meanwhile one feels sad for over 30 lives lost and several injured with serious burn injuries, many of whom may never be able to lead a normal life not to speak of being able to earn a livelihood. Power Plant accidents are not new. While building Power Plants I have myself seen fatal accidents from close quarters. Each accident haunts for days together tormenting what could have been done to save the precious life. In construction majority of accident happen because Safety is ignored. I can imagine scores of NTPC managers having sleepless nights tormented as they would be by the magnitude of this accident. One sincerely hopes people on the spot of accident should have been more careful in posting pictures on social media. It hurts.