New Delhi:

Stating that there has been consistent growth in energy requirements and peak demand in the country, Minister of State for Power Shripad Naik on Monday said that against a peak demand of 2,49,856 MW power across the country, the government has met 2,49,854 MW power demand from January to December last year.

He said that as of December 31, the country has achieved 209.44 gigawatts (GW) of installed capacity from renewable energy (RE) sources (including large hydro), and 167.21 GW of RE capacity is under installation.

The power generation in the country during the last five years and the current year up to December 2024 has been marked with ups and downs. In 2022-23, the total generation of power was 16,24,465 million units followed by 17,39,091 MU in 2023-24 and 13,79,930 MU in 2024-25 up to December 2024.

He said that the Electricity (Promoting Renewable Energy Through Green Energy Open Access) Rules, 2022, have been notified on June 6, 2022, to ensure access to affordable, reliable, and sustainable green energy for all.

“At present, three power exchanges, namely Indian Energy Exchange (IEX), Power Exchange India Limited (PXIL), and Hindustan Power Exchange (HPX), are functional in the country to ensure optimal utilisation of electricity generation resources,” said Naik while responding to a query regarding the initiatives taken by the government to modernise and restructure the nation’s electricity market, including the integration of renewable energy resources into the power grid.

“Green Energy Open Access is allowed to any consumer with a contract demand of 100 kW or above through single or multiple single connections aggregating 100 kW or more located in the same electricity division of a distribution licensee,” Naik said in the Rajya Sabha.

He further said that various market instruments, such as Green Open Access, Green Day-Ahead Market (GDAM), and Green Term Ahead Market (GTAM), have been introduced to facilitate the trading of green energy.

“Additionally, a real-time market has been implemented to help stakeholders manage their portfolios closer to real-time, addressing variability from renewable energy. Ancillary services are also being strengthened to support system balancing with higher renewable energy penetration,” Naik said.

The minister said that to boost RE consumption, the Renewable Purchase Obligation (RPO) followed by the Renewable Consumption Obligation (RCO) trajectory has been notified till 2029-30. The RCO, which applies to all designated consumers under the Energy Conservation Act 2001, will attract penalties for non-compliance.

He said that the Government of India has been implementing various performance-linked and result-oriented schemes to have a financially viable and sustainable power sector.

“These initiatives have been designed to tackle financial and operational issues of the distribution utilities to bring in desired financial discipline in them and the state governments,” Naik said.

Referring to the steps taken to reduce Aggregate Technical and Commercial (AT&C) losses, Naik said that prepaid smart metering is one of the critical interventions envisaged under RDSS to improve AT&C losses.

“It allows the distribution utilities to timely collect the revenues and measure energy flows at all levels, without any human interference. Proper and accurate energy accounting is the key to the identification of high-loss and theft-prone areas, which will improve the billing and collection efficiencies of the utilities significantly. As a result of concerted efforts made by the government, the AT&C losses have come down from 21.91 per cent in FY2021 to 15.37 per cent in FY2023,” Naik said.

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