Power fluctuations

Discoms are doing better but red lights still flash

power, electricity, IIP, grids, cyber security, demand, discoms, distribution, companies, firms, transmission, transformer, workers

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3 min read Last Updated : Apr 11 2023 | 9:53 PM IST

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The Power Finance Corporation’s latest Annual Integrated Ranking and Rating Report, the 11th in the series covering 71 power distribution companies (discoms), offers a relatively bright picture of the power sector in FY22, but the old problem of debt still darkens the outlook. On the positive side, FY22 saw a significant narrowing of the gap between the cost of supply per unit of power and the average revenue realised from 79 paise per unit of energy in FY20 to just 40 paise. The aggregate technical and commercial losses also fell to 16.5 per cent in FY22 from 21.5 per cent in FY21, reflecting an improvement in billing and collection efficiency, the bane of the Indian power sector.

This improved figure is, however, still no mean distance from the target of 12-15 per cent by 2024-25 set by the latest Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme, which links the operational and financial performance of discoms to fund disbursing centrally-sponsored schemes. At the s