New Delhi, Aug 29 (IANS) The union government has no proposal before it to give subsidy to coal importing power generators nor hike power tariff to make electricity from imported coal more viable, Minister of State for Power Jyotiraditya Scindia said Thursday.
In a written reply in parliament, the minister said the higher cost of imported coal is to be considered for pass-through as per modalities suggested by the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC).
“The Ministry of Power has issued appropriate advisory to CERC and SERCs (states) to consider the request of individual power producers to decide for pass-through of higher cost of imported coal on a case-to-case basis. Consequential changes in price of electricity would be the domain of appropriate regulatory commission,” Scindia said.
In an order last month allowing pass-through of imported coal cost in electricity rates for consumers, the CERC upheld the rise in rates for Odisha consumers due to blending of high cost imported coal in state-run generator NTPC’s projects.
The order was passed on a petition by Odisha’s electricity distributor, Gridco, seeking to get back the extra cost recovered by NTPC from consumers on account of blending of imported coal in 2011-12.
The CERC had earlier allowed Adani Power and Tata Power to charge a compensatory rate for the higher cost of imported coal.
Scindia had said last week that the government has advised power utilities to import 50 million tonnes of coal in the current fiscal, while the companies have sourced 30.2 million tonnes till July.
