ISLAMABAD: The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) on Tuesday estimated the public sector generation companies (Gencos) to have caused over Rs64 billion loss to the consumers due to extended outages.

In its latest performance evaluation reports (PERs), the regulator also found the majority of the transformers in the national grid to be overloaded, causing stability problems to the electricity network. The PERs are based on quarterly data provided by the companies themselves.

“Had these units not availed higher outage hours, a huge amount of energy — around 9373.003 million kWh – could have been contributed by them to the national grid, amounting to Rs64.629bn,” said the regulator in its PER 2017-18.

The regulator said the data submitted by Gencos for 2016-17 and 2017-18 reflected that a number of units or machines of different power stations had failed to ensure the approved net capacity standards on which they receive capacity payments.

This resulted into a cumulative energy loss of about 479.573m units, translating into a financial impact of Rs4.025bn.

Also, a number of power generating units of different power stations of Genco-I, II & III availed higher outage hours than allowed limit in their respective power purchase agreements, resulting in reduction of their plant availability factor. This resulted in energy loss of 9.4bn units or Rs64.63bn. The loss was contributed by Guddu, Kotri and Jamshoro generation plants to the extent of Rs48bn, Faisalabad station by Rs2bn, Muzaffargardh station by Rs6bn and Nandipur Rs7.7bn.

The data submitted by the Gencos for FY17 and FY18 showed that a number of units/machines of different power stations of Genco-I, II & III remained on standby mode for an alarming longer duration, which resulted in the consumption of auxiliary power and a subsequent financial loss of around Rs1.031bn. On inquiry, the Gencos revealed that instructions from the system operator (NPCC) due to no demand and fuel constraints were the major reasons of such longer duration of standby mode.

Published in Dawn, November 20th, 2019