INTRODUCTION:
Indian Power sector has been evolved over a period of time. Power sector started opening up to private participation from 1992 when the largest FDI has been approved in the form of ENPRON POWER PROJECT in the state of Maharashtra.
The tariff structure has been changed from single part tariff to two part tariff. The tariff includes the fixed cost and the variable cost.
Most of the countries coal reserve lies in the eastern part of the country while most of the power consumption states lie in the western part of the country. There was absence evacuation mechanism of power from one region to another region. As result of it different regions were used to operate at different frequencies. Also frequencies used to widely vary across the day putting network security at stake.
It was in October 1991 the Eastern and Northeastern grid was synchronized. It took a long 12 year period, March 2003, to synchronize the coal rich power producing states to the power consuming states of western INDIA.
During the intervening period of 1991 to 2003 there were frequent incidences of regional network failure due to wide variation of demand and supply.
States meet their demand of Power from the state run generating stations. The power of the generating stations from the central utility i.e. NTPC has been allotted to various states using the GADGIL formulae of capacity allocation.
The states used to meet their peak hour supplies from the short term power purchases from various power utilities. These Power utilities used to charge exponentially during the peak load when the demand of the generation rises during the peak load times of the day or the year.
Charging higher price P1 during the peak period is more profitable to the firm than charging a single price at all the times.
RS/Q MC P1 D1=AR1 P2
D2=AR2 MR1 MR2