The Appellate Tribunal for Electricity in an important and far-reaching judgement has upheld and continued the practices of reallocation of bays at substations considering the vicinity/complex approach adopted by Central Transmission Utility of India Limited (CTU), until the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) notifies the Regulation governing the field.
The issue involved related to the methodology and principles adopted by CTUIL on the aspects of how the reallocation of bays in a substation, which has become available on account of surrender/revocation by Grantees to existing Grantees of other substations or new applicants for connectivity adopting vicinity/Complex approach.
The above issue involved the interpretation of Regulations, namely, CERC (Grant of Connectivity, Long Term Access and Medium Term Access in Inter-State Transmission and Related Matters) 2009 [Connectivity Regulations] and CERC (Connectivity and General Network Access to the inter-State Transmission System) Regulations, 2022 [GNA Regulations] and the Detailed Procedure notified thereunder.
The Appeals filed by CTU and another Generator, namely, Project Nine Renewables challenged the order dated 19.01.2024 passed by CERC. The order dated 19.01.2024 was passed by CERC on Petitions filed by Generators- Eden Renewables seeking directions to be issued to CTUI for shifting of connectivity of their 300 MW Solar Power Project each from Fatehgarh-II Pooling Sub-Station (‘Fatehgarh-II PS’) to Fatehgarh-III Pooling Sub-Station (‘Fatehgarh-III PS’) or Bhadla II Pooling Sub-Station (‘Bhadla-II PS’) on account of the situation faced by Eden Bercy & Eden Passy regarding the requirement of underground dedicated transmission line from its Solar Power Projects to Fatehgarh II PS.
By order dated 19.01.2024, CERC held as under:
- CTU to stop the exercise of reallocation of bays holding that the re-allocation of bays was based on a criteria adopted on a case-to-case basis in a non-transparent and non-uniform basis;
- Issued the Practice Directions on which the reallocation exercise be conducted henceforth until appropriate amendments to the Regulations are issued;
- Reallocation carried out pursuant to minutes of meeting for reallocation meetings held on 20.06.2023 and 03.08.2023 or any subsequent reallocation meeting held for substations in Rajasthan be reconsidered in light of our observations
The Appellate Tribunal after critically analyzing the contentions of relevant parties including CERC set aside the order dated 19.01.2024 passed by CERC and directed that till the Regulations are amended, the existing practice of reallocation considering vicinity/complex approach adopted by CTU shall continue.
As regards the finding that CTU adopted a non-transparent approach in the reallocation exercise, the Appellate Tribunal held that the reallocation meetings were held in consultation with various other important stakeholders responsible for planning, development and operation of the electricity system, optimal utilization of resources including the development of renewable energy sources like CEA, SECI, Grid Controller of India, respective Load dispatch centres and therefore, the findings of non-transparent approach cannot be sustained. The Appellate Tribunal, however, agreed with the views of CERC regarding non-transparency as far as disclosure of procedure, Agenda and Minutes of such reallocation meetings on the website of CTU is concerned.
As regards the finding that CTU adopted a case to case approach in reallocation exercise, the Appellate Tribunal while disagreeing with the finding held that the process adopted by CTU has been followed since 2018 and Eden Renewables itself has been a beneficiary of the process and more importantly, apart from the Petition filed by Eden Renewables, there had been no complaint in regard to the process adopted by CTU.
As regards the Practice Directions issued by CERC, the Appellate Tribunal held that existing Regulations are fraught with the problems indicated by CTU. Further, it has been held that while the practice directions, according to CERC, has prospective application, it has the effect of unsettling some of the decisions taken in reallocation meetings/CMETS meetings on & prior to the date of the impugned order i.e. 19.01.2024, resulting in some decisions being re-opened.