State-run Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) drew heavy flak on Friday for seeking to change the way ‘prosumers’ – consumers who also produce electricity and sell it to the grid – are metered and billed.
At an online hearing, individual prosumers owning grid-tied rooftop solar plants were joined by institutions such as the Agency for New and Renewable Energy Research and Technology (Anert) and Cochin International Airport Ltd (CIAL) in urging the State Electricity Regulatory Commission (KSERC) to reject the KSEB plea for ‘modifications’ to the KSERC (Renewable Energy and Net Metering Regulations).
Majority of the participants strongly objected to the KSEB proposal to replace net metering with the gross metering principle for billing prosumers and slash the settlement charge it pays them from ₹3.22 to ₹2.44 per unit.
Anert CEO Narendra Nath Veluri told the commission that the KSEB proposal would disincentivise solar projects and adversely impact the ongoing Soura rooftop solar scheme. It also contradicted the aims of the government’s Urja Kerala Mission, he said.
CIAL officials informed the commission that the KSEB proposal, if accepted, would render megawatt-scale plants unviable. For CIAL, it will cause additional expenses to the tune of ₹10 crore during the current fiscal, ”leading to negative cash flow to the return on investment made by CIAL in the renewable energy front,” they said.
(Under net metering, a prosumer needs to pay only for the difference between what he sells to the grid and what he draws from it. Under gross metering, both activities are separately metered and billed, and prosumers fear it will leave them with hefty power bills.)
Participants at the hearing argued that the KSEB proposal to change the metering method would defeat the very purpose of solar and other renewable energy initiatives. It would render projects unviable and drive away future investments. Furthermore, the KSEB petition was ambiguous and in variance with the pro-solar policies of the Central and state governments, they alleged.
The KSEB has also failed to fulfil its Renewable Purchase Obligation (RPO) which requires electricity distribution licensees to purchase/produce part of their requirement from renewable energy sources, they said.
‘Clear violation’
The HT/EHT Industrial Electricity Consumers Association said the KSEB plea was a clear violation of Clause 7 of the State Solar Policy which says that ”for all agencies that consume grid power and have installed solar installations with some form of government subsidy, only net metering shall be applicable.”
The KSEB officials said their demand for gross metering was in line with the Electricity (Rights of Consumers) Rules, 2020 and the Electricity (Rights of Consumers) Amendment Rules, 2021 notified by the Ministry of Power. Net metering was introduced to encourage solar generation in the nascent stages. With the increase in solar penetration, this method was causing huge losses to the utility, they claimed.
