November spot power price falls 20 pc to Rs 2.85 per unit

Average spot power price fell 20 per cent to Rs 2.85 per unit in November as compared to the year-ago month, the Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) said on Thursday.

The average spot price or market price of electricity in November 2018 was 3.58 a unit, IEX said in a statement.

"The day-ahead market (DAM) traded 3,389 million units (MU) with an average market clearing price at only Rs 2.85 per unit vs price of Rs 3.58 in November 2018, a 20 per cent decline in price," it said.

In the day-ahead market (DAM), total monthly sell bids were 8,579 MU while buy bids were 4,108 MU, it added.

The 'One Nation-One Price' prevailed for 26 days during the month. The inter-state congestion for the remaining days was on account of import of power to southern states.

"In the term-ahead market (TAM), volumes rose 157 per cent year-on-year on the back of a growing number of distribution utilities turning to TAM contracts especially intra-day, daily, weekly for meeting their short-term power demand," the IEX said.

According to data from the National Load Despatch Center, all-India peak demand at 156 gigawatts (GW) in November 2019 declined 4 per cent as against the demand of 162 GW in November 2018 and the energy met at 3.3 billion units declined 5 per cent y-o-y.

"The primary reason for this decline was economic slowdown as well as early onset of winters," it said.

On November 27, the Renewable Energy Certificate (REC) market at the IEX saw a total trade of 3.29 lakh RECs comprising of 2.92 lakh non-solar RECs and 0.37 lakh solar RECs.

The price for non-solar RECs issued after April 1, 2017, at Rs 1,800 increased 9 per cent from Rs 1,650 in October 2019 and price for solar RECs at Rs 2,400 remained unchanged from October 2019.

The continuing increase in REC prices has been mainly due to shortfall on account of low inventory since March 2019, IEX said.