Strong recovery of industrial and commercial demand for electricity showed that India’s consumption grew by almost 45 percent in the first half of April to 60.62 billion units (BU), over the corresponding period one year earlier. Energy consumption was recorded in 41.91 BU in the first half of April of last year (1st to 15th April), the highest demand for power met the highest supply in a day, remained well above the highest level of 132,20 GW in the same period in April 2020, during the first half of this month.
“The peak power demand in the first half of April 2021 reached 182.55 GW at its highest level and increased by 38% over 132.20 GW recorded throughout April last year. In the same month of 2019, energy consumption decreased to 84.55 BU in April last year from 110.11 BU. This was mainly due to the lower economic activity after the government locked the spread of deadly COVID-19 in the final week of March 2020”, said Raj Kumar Singh, Power minister of India.
Peak power demand met sank to 132.20 GW, which showed the impact of lockdown on economic activities in April last year, from 177.81 GW in the same month in 2019. Experts believe that both, high electricity consumption and demand growth in the first half of this month is mainly due to the basic impact, which led to the downturn of energy consumption in April last year. The high rate of growth in energy consumption now clearly shows a healthy recovery in commercial and industrial demand, the potential adverse effects of commercial and industrial energy consumption by local locks across the country, to curb the rise of COVID-19 positivity.
Following six months of gaps, electricity consumption grew by four.6% in September and 11.6% in October, year-on-year. (Consumption of unintentional drop in voltage for electrical power supply system) growth has decreased to 3.12 percent in November 2020, mainly as a result of the early start of winter. The consumption of energy in December increased by 4.5%, while in January 2021, it rose by 4.4%. Power consumption was up 104,11 BU in February this year, from 103,81 BU the previous year, even though the year of 2020 was a slow year and electricity consumption was up nearly 23% from 98,95 BUs in the same month of 2020 to 121,51 BU. For the entire 2020-21 fiscal year, electricity consumption decreased from 1,284,44 BU in 2019-20 one percent to 1,271,54 BU.
“We have introduced new rules on the cross-border trade in electricity. They define the contours and determine who may buy from and sell into India on the electricity market in South Asia. This has consequences for the Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal electricity markets that have aligned their energy futures to the Indian market to varying degrees. The new regulations show that India has an unequivocally political approach. It tries to reconcile China’s growing influence in the region with its own and regional development objectives”, said Raj Kumar Singh.
South Asia’s electricity policy has taken a hold. In the months following the government of Narendra Modi, in 2014, India took historic steps towards the liberalization of the electricity trade, under the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). China quickly started to feel its presence in the region, and India responded by regressing its free-market momentum
