[ad_1]
Dushyant Singh Pundir
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, March 31
In a major relief, the Joint Electricity Regulatory Commission (JERC) has approved a reduction in the tariff for all categories of more than 2.34 lakh electricity consumers for 2021-22 on account of being revenue surplus.
‘No fuel and power purchase cost adjustment charges’
Giving another relief to consumers, the JERC directed the Electricity Department to discontinue the recovery of the fuel and power purchase cost adjustment (FPPCA) charges from all consumer categories starting April 1, 2021, till further orders.
On a tariff revision petition filed by the UT Electricity Department, the JERC, in an order passed on Tuesday, observed: “The petitioner had a standalone revenue surplus each year from 2016-17 to 2019-20. Further, the projected standalone surplus for 2021-22 and the cumulative revenue surplus till 2021-22 at the existing tariff is expected to be Rs98.21 crore and Rs345.61 crore, respectively.”
In view of the standalone revenue surplus, the JERC approved a reduction in the retail tariff for the existing categories, which works out to be 9.58 per cent. Even after a reduction in the average tariff, the projected standalone revenue surplus at the end of 2021-22 is expected to be Rs8.12 crore, stated the commission.
Giving another relief to the consumers, the JERC directed the Electricity Department to discontinue the recovery of the fuel and power purchase cost adjustment (FPPCA) charges from all consumer categories starting April 1, 2021, till further orders. The FPPCA charges are imposed on users on a quarterly basis, and are in addition to the tariff imposed in the bill. However, the department has been directed to submit the quarterly FPPCA calculation to the commission for a review. The commission has also approved the average billing rate (ABR) of Rs5.10/kWh against the approved average cost of supply (ACoS) of Rs5.05/kWh for 2021-22.
The new tariff will come into force with effect from April 1, 2021, and will continue till further orders of the commission.
In order to promote the use of electric vehicles (EV), the JERC has reduced the tariff for EV charging stations from Rs4 per kWh to Rs3.60 per kWh.
The last increase in the domestic and commercial electricity tariff was in 2018-2019.
In the domestic category, the approved rate is Rs2.50 in the slab of 0-150 units, Rs4.25 in the slab of 151-400 units; and in the slab of above 400 units, the rate is Rs4.65 per unit.
In the commercial consumer category, the new rate is Rs4.50 in the slab between 0-150 units; in the slab of 151-400 units, the rate is Rs4.70 per unit and in the above 400 kWh slab, it is Rs5 per unit.
[ad_2]
Source link
