Govt to introduce real-time power market from April 1, says CERC chairman

Real-time power market is expected to kick in from April 1 next year, following which consumers including discoms or captive users can buy power at exchanges just one hour before delivery, said a senior official on Wednesday.

At present, the consumers including discoms or captive users can buy power one day prior in Day Ahead Market (DAM) at power exchanges where trading is done for two hours daily from 10 am to 12 noon.

"We are hoping that real-time power market will kick in from April 1, 2020. The hearing (of stakeholders) on the draft regulation on real-time power market is complete," Central Electricity Regulatory Authority Commission (CERC) Chairman P K Pujari told reporters on the sidelines of the 22nd India Power Forum 2019 here.

Pujari further said "it is not that real-time power market will kick in immediately after the finalisation or approval of the regulation by the CERC. In order to bring it, we have to put a system in place. So we have to give time. There is need for a software (trading solution) for that and people need to be educated about that."

The main purpose of introducing real-time power market is to deal with the renewables interference and better portfolio management by discoms, gencos and other consumers.

With more and more renewable energy capacity being added to power grid, there would be need for sudden ramp up and down sizing of supply.

Consumers including discoms can plan their energy supplies in a better way and gencos would be able to increase or decrease their output accordingly.

A senior Indian Energy Exchange official told that under the proposed draft regulation, there would be 48 session of half an hour each in a day. That means the trading of electricity would be done round the clock.

The official further said that after the closing of hour-an-hour session, the power delivery can be scheduled at an interval of one hour.

Thus, if a consumer buys power in a session between 1:30 pm to 2 pm then the power supply can be scheduled as early as 3 pm the same day.