Summary of Electricity (Promoting Renewable Energy Through Green Energy Open Access) Rules, 2022

OA Eligibility

? Any consumer having contract demand/sanctioned load ≥ 100 kilowatts (kW).

• No capacity limit for captive consumers.

Nodal Agency

? A central nodal agency to be set up to maintain a centralised public registry/portal for all green OA consumers.

? All OA applications after getting registered in the centralised registry will get routed to the concerned nodal agency.

? Concerned Nodal Agency:

o Short-Term OA: Load Dispatch Centre (LDC)

o Medium-Term OA: State Transmission Utility (STU)

o Long-Term OA: Central Transmission Utility (CTU)

OA Charges

? Only six kinds of OA charges have been specified:

a) Transmission Charges

d) Standby Charges

b) Wheeling Charges

e) Additional Surcharge (AS)

c) Cross Subsidy Surcharge (CSS)

f) Banking Charge

? AS is not applicable on renewable energy OA if the consumer already pays fixed charges. ? CSS and AS do not apply to Waste-to-Energy plants.

? CSS on a C&I consumer will not increase by more than 50% during 12 year period from the “commercial operation date” of the OA plant.

OA Grant Procedure

? All OA applications to be submitted on a centralised OA portal.

? Approval window of OA applications by concerned nodal agency: 15 days.

? OA applications priority: Long-Term > Medium-Term > Short-Term

Banking

? Minimum banking settlement period: monthly

? Minimum banking allowed (as % of energy consumption): 30%

Green Energy Tariff

? DISCOM obliged to supply green energy upon request by a consumer on payment of an additional charge – Green Energy Tariff.

? Any such requisition from the consumer shall be for a minimum period of one year.

? Renewable energy consumed by a consumer in excess of its RPO obligation is counted towards RPO compliance of DISCOM.

Green Energy Rating

? Consumers will be rated based on the percentage of renewable energy consumed.

Green Hydrogen/Ammonia

? Green hydrogen/ammonia purchase to be counted towards RPO fulfilment.

? CSS and AS are not applicable on renewable energy utilised for producing green hydrogen/ammonia.

Source: Ministry of Power, JMK Research

Excerpts from "India’s Renewable Energy Open Access Market: Trends and Outlook"?by JMK Research & IEEFA