The Kerala State Electricity Regulatory Commission has rejected a proposal for introducing restrictions of up to 15 per cent on most consumer categories.

This formed part of the approved aggregate revenue requirement and expected revenue from charges (ARR & ERC) for 2012-13 for the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB).

Based on the approved ARR & ERC, the commission provisionally arrived at a revenue gap of Rs 1,889.15 crore for the year ahead.

Revenue gap

It approved an ARR of Rs 7,986.39 crore and an ERC of Rs 6,097.24 crore as against Rs 9,638.12 crore and Rs 6,397.87 crore respectively projected by KSEB.

Given this context, the commission proceeded to ‘estimate the revenue gap without involving power restrictions.’

The revenue gap approved for 2012-13 is Rs 1,889.15 crore against Rs 3,240.25 crore projected, the order issued by the commission said.

The revenue gap would have been Rs 4,337.08 crore as against Rs 3,240.25 crore projected, if power restrictions were not incorporated in the proposal submitted.

The KSEB has filed a petition for revision of tariff to earn additional revenue of about Rs 1,586 crore, which was being processed.

Till a final decision is taken on the tariff petition, the existing tariff will continue, the commission said.

Split-up costs

The KSEB had also submitted a statement showing the function-wise split-up of costs on a tentative basis along with the ARR & ERC petition.

“There are many grey areas in the computation, such as apportioning of equity base, loss, fixed assets, capital liabilities, etc.

“In the absence of a clear demarcation of functional costs, the details could not be verified at this stage.

“Further, the validity of assumptions made for function-level disaggregation require in-depth examination,” the order said.

Hence, the commission was not in a position to authenticate the functional costs. It deferred the analysis of the functional costs for the time being.

>vinson@thehindu.co.in

 

 

 

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