In a recent order, Tamil Nadu Electricity Regulatory Commission (TNERC) issued a draft in intra state open access regulation 2014 and has invited comments from stakeholders. On submission of comments by concerned stakeholders, the matter will be re examined by commission.
Till now Tamil Nadu was the only state who allowed open access to consumers with less than 1 MW capacity. Earlier on request of the government of Tamil Nadu, the commission allowed open access below 1 MW capacity due to power shortage scenarios across the state. But with the revived power generation capacity in the state, the Government of Tamil Nadu submitted the petition dated 17.04.2018 for allowing open access any above 1 MW capacity demand.
In support of the prayer, Gov of Tamil Nadu gave the following implications in allowing open access to consumers with demand less than 1 MW :
a. Consumers are evading paying cross subsidy surcharges to DISCOM by wheeling captive power instead of getting it from 3rd party sales. Consequently, DISCOM is losing a good amount of revenue year on year.
b. The Tamil Nadu DISCOM has to pay fixed charges for the open access consumers by high cost power purchase and also DISCOM has to compensate wind captive power plant (CPP) consumers for their banked power.
c. The above two implications affect the DISCOM’s revenue which result in tariff revision for low end consumers.
d. As a result, all of the above implications affect future development for quality & cheaper power for the public of Tamil Nadu.
In view of the above explanation, Tamil Nadu commission suggested the following points in open access regulation 2014.
Open access should be allowed to all EHT & HT consumers under the intra state transmission system where demand for maximum power in 1MW and above at any given time.
Further open access shall be allowed to all EHT & HT consumers within their contracted demand. Consumers who want to procure solar & wind power through open access, the contracted demand for the consumer should be percentage of guaranteed capacity utilization factor (CUF) specified in tariff orders of the commission.
CUF of 29.15% for the wind energy generator (WEGs) commissioned from 07.10.2020 and 21% for solar power generators (SPGs) commissioned from 16.10.2020 should be considered.
Example :
For a 2 MW WEG commissioned in 2021, the contracted demand shall be : 29.15/100* 2=0.583 MW.
For a 2 MW SPG commissioned in 2021, the contracted demand shall be : 21/100* 2=0.42 MW.
