Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by rahulsidhu 3640 days ago
I am afraid this picture is far from accurate. Power plants on the whole are running at a very low PLF for some time. Very cheap power is available in the short term markets[1]. The transmission system has also improved in the last two years and now prices are more or less uniform across the country[1].

Last mile distribution infrastructure is still a WIP in many places but the real problem is financial. Many distribution companies are owned by state govts. and unable to charge/recover for the electricity they distribute. This incentivizes them to procure/supply as little power as possible. Many states have now opted for a financial restructuring [2] and I expect demand will pick up sharply.

[1] http://www.vidyutpravah.in/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ujwal_DISCOM_Assurance_Yojana

1 comments

#2 may be outdated. #3 can be debated, but there were brown-outs and black-outs during the summer.

Things have improved, but the pace is not something to write home about.

Complaining about pace is moving the goal posts here, and yes power shortages are a lot scarcer.

I sell gensets in the southern states and the market is shrinking.

Additionally what's being missed in this entire chain is that the new CPCB norms were released a few years ago and all gensets sold in india now conform to it one way or the other.

To still add to this - most gensets don't run as much as they are able to. For a majority of sets they run very little in the span of years.

The OP gave an example where power was not given to a mall due to corruption, not lack of power.