ORDER

Under clause (j) of sub-section (2) of Section 178 of the Electricity Act, 2003 (hereinafter referred to as “the Act”), the Commission is empowered to make regulations for payment of transmission charges and a surcharge, if any, for open access for use of the transmission system owned by the Central Transmission Utility. Similarly, under clause (l) of sub-section (2) of Section 178 of the Act, the Commission is further authorised to specify by regulations the payment of transmission charges on account of use of the transmission system of other transmission licensee. Further, in accordance with sub-section (47) of Section 2 of the Act, the terms and conditions for open access in inter-state transmission are required to be specified by the Commission through the regulations. The regulations made under the Act are to be finalised after previous publication.

2. As a part of the consultative process, a concept paper prepared by the Commission’s staff was circulated among the stakeholders and other interested persons during June 2003 with a view to inviting their suggestions before drafting of regulations. After hearing the stakeholders concerned on 24^th & 25^th September, 2003, we had issued an order in the matter of open access in inter-state transmission on 14.11.2003. Subsequently, based on the decisions contained in the said order dated 14.11.2003, the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (Terms and conditions for Open Access) Regulations, 2003, (hereinafter referred to as “the draft regulations”) on open-access were published on 2.12.2003 with a fresh opportunity to the stakeholders of making their comments and suggestions on the proposals contained in the draft regulations. In response, we have received comments and suggestions from the stakeholders, which will be discussed at the appropriate places in this order.

Date of implementation

3. The draft regulations propose that they shall come into force with immediate effect, that is, the date of publication in the official gazette. POWERGRID has suggested that regulations should be implemented from 1.4.2004, as this will allow time for resolving all the relevant issues and fully understanding the intricacies involved.

4. With the enactment of the Act, the provisions on open access in the inter-state transmission system have already come into effect. Therefore, the modalities for its smooth implementation have to be finalised at the earliest. It is for this purpose that we proposed the time limits for certain actions to be completed by different agencies like, the Central Transmission Utility, the Regional Load Despatch Centres, the State Load Despatch Centres, etc. The avenues, intricacies as well as problems will only be understood over a period of time after the actual implementation of the final regulations. We, therefore, are not inclined to stipulate 1.4. 2004 as the date of implementation. However, in the light of 60 days time being allowed to users of the inter-state transmission system other than those having firm allocation from the central generating stations and the bulk power transmission agreement with the Central Transmission Utility, we direct that provisions regarding bidding for reservation of transmission capacity shall come into effect after a period of 90 days from the date of coming into force of the regulations on open access, on publication in the official gazette. Till that time, the reservation of the capacity shall be done on first-come-first-served basis provided that the period for such reservation shall not exceed this period of 90 days.

Definitions

5. In the draft regulations, the term "embedded customer" is defined as a person who is not a direct customer, and a direct customer is defined to mean as a person directly connected to the inter-state transmission system. Koyela Energy Resources Pvt. Ltd (KERPL) has submitted that definition of embedded customers needs more clarity.

6. We have considered the issue afresh in the context of the definit