Power supply deficit 0.9% in April-June quarter

Overall power deficit was 0.9 per cent in the April-June quarter of this fiscal as 292.82 billion units were supplied against a demand of 295.34 billion units, Parliament was informed today.
During the quarter, 2,92,822 million units of power was supplied against the demand of 2,95,344 million units, Power Minister Piyush Goyal said in a written reply to Lok Sabha.
In 2015-16, the overall power deficit was 2.11 per cent as 1090.85 billion units were supplied against the demand of 1114.40 billion units.
Government has planned to make the country energy surplus with a target of generating 1,178 billion units, leading to 1.1 per cent overall electricity surplus during this fiscal.

According to the Load Generation Balance Report (LGBR) for 2016-17, the Centre has set a target of generating 1,178 billion units with overall surplus of 1.1 per cent and peak surplus of 2.6 per cent.
In a separate reply, Goyal said the government is making efforts to provide for the coal, power & renewable sectors a possible investment opportunity of about USD 250 billion during five-year period between 2015 to 2020.

When extrapolated to a 15-year programme until 2030, the coal, power and renewable sector alone provides USD 1 trillion opportunity, he said.
The investment will be in area like transmission, opening of new mines, to bring technology into the coal sector, push towards energy efficiency, to bring in new coal generating plants which will be environmentally superior plants, to make distribution sector profitable business for the state discoms.

In another reply the minister said:"To increase generation of power, capacity addition of 1,18,537 MW (including 88,537 MW conventional and 30,000 MW renewable) was planned during the 12th Plan (by 2016-17). As against this, about 86,565 MW from conventional sources and about 19,500 MW from renewable sources have been achieved till June 30, 2016."
He also said that today, about 41 per cent of generation capacity is private and private sector investments are also flowing in the transmission sector.
"Preliminary estimation by Central Electricity Authority reveal that around Rs 32 lakh crore would be required for meeting expenditure on generation, transmission and distribution alone during 2017-2027. Over and above this, there would be commensurate investments required for research and development, manpower needs, energy conservation measures etc," he added.

The total transmission capacity of inter-regional links is 59,550 MW (as on June 2016) which is expected to increase to 68,050 MW by March 2017, he added.