Bhubaneswar: The Odisha Electricity Regulatory Commission (OERC) has kept the retail power tariff unchanged for all categories of consumers for the ensuing 2025-26 financial year.
The regulator had reduced tariff by 10 paise for domestic consumers in the current 2024-25 fiscal.
OERC secretary Priyabrat Patnaik has said that the commission has not effected any hike in the electricity charges for the fourth consecutive year.
The last hike was in 2021-22 when an overall increase of 5.6 per cent (30 paise per unit) for all categories of consumers except BPL and irrigation was effected.
Consumers with smart meters up to 2 kilo watt connected load will be exempted from meter rent of `60 per month. The cost of the meter rent will be borne by the state government as an incentive to encourage consumers to opt for smart meters, a move vigorously pushed by Tata Power.
Patnaik said consumers with pre-paid meters will get a four per cent rebate on pre-paid amount and the low transmission (LT) domestic and single-phase general purpose consumers will continue to enjoy four per cent digital payment rebate. All consumers provided with smart meters and contract demand of more than 10 KW, except irrigation and agriculture consumers will be eligible for a time of day (ToD) rebate of 20 paise per unit in energy charge during solar hours (8 am to 4 pm). They will pay a surcharge of 30 paise per unit during peak hours (6 pm to midnight).
The primary goal of ToD tariff is to encourage consumers to reduce their electricity consumption during peak hours (when demand is high and costs are higher) and increase it during off-peak hours (when demand is lower and costs are lower).
Allowing a revenue gap of Rs 798 crore in the annual revenue requirement of GRIDCO for the ensuing financial year, OERC in the bulk supply tariff order said the trading utility will make up the shortfall from bulk trading of surplus power.
The commission has marginally increased the average bulk supply price (BSP) from 328.20 paise to 330.66 paise per unit as against GRIDCO’s demand for a hike of 53.64 paisa per unit. The aggregated technical and commercial (AT&C) loss approved for tariff determination was 17.33 per cent for 2025-26 as against 18.79 per cent approved for 2024-25, Patnaik said.
