Telangana Govt’s regulatory hindering solar open access progress

Open Access Customers are consumers, traders, distribution licensees, or generating companies authorized by the State Electricity Regulatory Commission to obtain electricity from sources other than the local distribution licensee. This system allows large consumers, with a connected load above 1 MW, to purchase affordable power directly from the open market. 4o

Hyderabad: The State government, which claims of big plans to promote solar energy in Telangana, has however not been able to create a conducive environment for the promotion of solar open access initiatives here. In fact, the State government’s regulatory policies are reportedly hindering the progress of solar open access initiatives in Telangana.

Open Access Customers are those consumer, trader, distribution licensee or a generating company permitted by the State Electricity Regulatory Commission to receive supply of electricity from a person other than distribution licensee of his area of supply. Open Access enables heavy users with more than 1 MW connected load to buy cheap power from the open market.

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The situation of solar open access could be gauged by the fact that Telangana didn’t witness any solar open access capacity additions in Q2 2024. In the previous quarter, only 1 MW of solar open access capacity was added. As of June 2024, Telangana had the tenth-highest cumulative installed solar open access capacity, with 329.5 MW, accounting for just 2 percent of the country’s total.

People complained that though they were applying for feasibility, permissions were not granted and the applications just sat there with no response. Sources say developers who established projects were only granted medium-term open access permissions, valid for two years, as opposed to long-term access. Even these medium-term permits were a source of constant hurdles, with renewals sometimes taking six to nine months, the sources added.

Solar energy developers claimed that the main bottleneck for the growth of open access was the fear of State regulators losing out on cross – subsidy charges from high tariff paying commercial and industrial customers to the discoms. In addition to this, changes in banking period and additional surcharges currently plague the Open Access system.

State level players have an instrumental role in determining the success of the open access system, and hence the state government along with State Electricity Regulatory Commission and DISCOMs must ensure the implementation of the draft rules both in letter and action,