RERC Proposes Regulation Changes For Rajasthan’s Net-Meter Consumers 

The Rajasthan State Electricity Regulatory Commission (RERC) recently issued its draft Regulation for Grid Interactive Distributed Renewable Energy Generating Systems, where it has sought changes in some norms related to its net-meter consumers. The Commission has now asked the public and other stakeholders to send in their suggestions on the draft regulation by May 26, 2023. 

The proposed regulation is named RERC (Grid Interactive Distributed Renewable Energy Generating Systems) (First Amendment) Regulations, 2023. This regulation primarily covers the rules related to net meter users of Rajasthan. 

In its latest draft regulation, the state commission has proposed changes in mainly four provisions of its older 2021 Regulation. The earlier regulation had put the ceiling on RE generation under net billing arrangement up to the minimum CUF/PLF in percent plus 5 percent. However, the new norms tried to revise the provision. The new norms said such generations should be within the agreed AC capacity. 

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“The peak AC capacity of the Renewable Energy generating station installed under the Net Billing arrangement shall not exceed the AC capacity agreed under the Connection Agreement. In the case at any point of time, if the peak AC capacity exceeds the above agreed AC capacity, the corresponding excess generation shall lapse,” the new amendment provision of the draft regulation said. 

The new regulation also empowered the RERC to have its say in the excess renewable energy production during the billing period. 

“If the quantum of electricity exported by a domestic category consumer exceeds the quantum imported during the Billing Period, the excess quantum exported by such domestic consumer shall be purchased by the Distribution Licensee at the weighted average tariff of large-scale solar projects of 5 MW and more, discovered through Competitive Bidding in last Financial Year, and adopted by the Commission plus 15%,” the new proposed provision said. 

The proposed draft regulation of RERC has also changed the concept of levying the highest slab for the net imported energy for net-meter consumers by changing it with another word ‘applicable slab”. “…for Net Metering consumers, the Net imported energy (Total Consumption from all sources- Allowable Solar Generation) from the grid shall be billed according to the applicable slab corresponding to the total consumption from all sources,” the draft regulation said. 

The RERC draft has also proposed a new provision by amending section 15, which talks about exempting cross-subsidy surcharge and additional surcharge for RESCO-owned RE generating systems under net-meter arrangements setup for domestic category consumers, state government buildings, local bodies, and public undertakings of the state.