Power Sector: Focus On Other Pain Points

While there’s enough capacity now, flexible generation, tariffs and regulation must be addressed to remain power-surplus

MATTERS OF FACT

On the face of it, media reports painted a scary picture. One report mentioned that as many as 262 thermal power units had shut down operations by early November. Many of them have been shut for weeks. Another report said Coal India’s output fell to its lowest in six years in September on account of heavy rains. Not just that. Its coal shipment that month was a fiveyear low. Central Electricity Authority (CEA) data revealed that the plant load factor (PLF) of thermal units in the April-September 2019 period (at 57.67 per cent) was the lowest in a decade. Even worse, by end-September it had dropped further to 51 per cent.

Under these circumstances, the country should have been in a state of crisis with a crippling electricity shortage that would have brought industrial, commercial and retail consumers to their knees. But that is not the case. This fiscal, peak demand for electricity has been more or less met. The deficit was just 0.7 per cent. To put this in perspective, a decade ago this shortfall, in meeting peak demand, was 12.7 per cent.

This has been possible because India has finally overcome the capacity constraint that dogged power generation since Independence. That, indeed, is a significant achievement. In fact, the total generation capacity today at 3,64,960 MW is good enough to meet any surge in demand for the next few years even if economic growth picks up pace. Frequent load shedding and tripping of the electricity grids, it appears, is history.