The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) has worked out the average power purchase cost (APPC) at the national level at Rs 3.85 per unit for 2021-22 after addressing the stakeholders’ comments and based on the tariff orders issued by the state electricity regulatory commissions and joint electricity regulatory commissions for the year 2020-21. CERC had fixed APPC for 2017-18 at Rs 3.48 per unit, Rs 3.53 per unit for 2018-19 and Rs 3.60 per unit for 2019-20. APCC is for the power procurement by the distribution companies from generators under the long term contracts, bilateral contracts and from power exchanges.
According to CERC’s order, the APPC for Odisha is the lowest at Rs 2.46 per unit while the highest is Rs 18.45 per unit for Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
The state and UT wise APPC includes Madhya Pradesh (Rs 16.13 per unit), Assam (Rs 5.14 per unit), Andhra Pradesh (Rs 4.71 per unit), Mizoram (Rs 4.48 per unit), Uttar Pradesh (Rs 4.45 per unit), Karnataka (Rs 4.38 per unit), Delhi (Rs 4.11 per unit), Jharkhand (Rs 4.11 per unit), Punjab and Nagaland (Rs 4.07 per unit), Sikkim (Rs 4.06 per unit), Maharashtra (Rs 4 per unit), Haryana (Rs 3.99 per unit), Daman & Diu (Rs 3.96 per unit),Rajasthan (Rs 3.94 per unit), Telangana (Rs 3.92 per unit), Dadra & Nagar Haveli (Rs 3.85 per unit), Tamil Nadu (Rs 3.73 per unit), Gujarat (Rs 3.67 per unit), Manipur and Tripura (Rs 3.64 per unit), West Bengal (Rs 3.55 per unit), Uttarakhand (Rs 3.47 per unit), Chandigarh (Rs 3.44 per unit) and Meghalaya (Rs 3.08 per unit).
States and UTs with APPC below Rs 3 per unit comprise Goa (Rs 2.83 per unit), Kerala (Rs 2.87 per unit), Jammu and Kashmir (Rs 2.77 per unit) and Himachal Pradesh (Rs 2.57 per unit).
CERC said the APPC at the national level has been obtained by computing the average of APPC of all states and Union Territories (UT), weighted by volume of conventional power purchased by the respective state and UT. However, the total cost of power purchase considered for computation of APPC excludes cost of generation or procurement from renewable energy sources and transmission charges. State wise power procurement volume was 1118588 million units at the cost of Rs 4,31,210 crore for 2020-21.
According to CERC, exclusion of cost of generation or procurement from renewable sources is in alignment with the objective of determining APPC, which is to ascertain the average cost of power from conventional sources of electricity. Furthermore, with a view of ascertaining energy costs only, transmission charges are excluded from these calculations.
