The Tamil Nadu Electricity Regulatory Commission (TNERC) said Tangedco can conduct verification of the captive generation plant status, rejecting a plea of stakeholders that it should be done by an independent agency.
In a recent order, the State regulator laid down the procedure to be followed for verification of the status of captive generating plant (CGP), as per directions of the Madras High Court.
The Centre and the State governments promoted the captive power model to ensure more competition. Under the model, a group of consumers come together and set up plants to meet power requirements, without depending on the State utility or grid.
They can sell the surplus power to the State grid and are excluded from levy of cross-subsidy charges. As per existing norms, the owners of captive power plant need to consume 51% of the power and the remaining can be sold to other industrial users, who are required to own 26% in the captive power plant. Non-compliance with the procedures would result in loss of captive power status and they would have to pay the requisite charges.
“Most stakeholders have objected to the delegation of powers of verification of CGP status of generators to Tangedco. Their request is for determination of captive status either by the Commission or delegating the verification process to an independent agency like the Chief Electrical Inspectorate to Government (CEIG) or to a committee that shall be constituted by the Commission,” TNERC said.
In its response, Tangedco said the number of captive generators and consumers is distinctively high in this State, pointing out that there are about 7,300 generators in captive mode and 3,000 captive consumers. Verification by a third party agency or even by the CEIG would require considerable manpower and training, it added.
The TNERC said the High Court had clearly permitted Tangedco to do the verification.