The Tamil Nadu Electricity Regulatory Commission (TNERC) has directed the Tangedco to evolve a proposal for creating a new category of tariffs for consumers who seek electricity for use in common areas in large residential projects, but refused to grant relief to a property developer seeking reclassification of the electricity connection.
The order came after a real estate property developer, Ozone Project Pvt Ltd, approached the Commission, regarding tariff being imposed at its project, Metrozone, in Anna Nagar. The company is developing the property in a 40-acre land and obtained permission for construction of 30 residential towers, of which six have been completed and seven more are to be handed over.
According to the petition, the company had applied for a service connection under High Tension Tariff III for the loads relating to common amenities for the six towers and obtained the HT connection. The individual apartment owners have been provided with Low Tension service connections.
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The petition sought a direction from the Commission to the Superintending Engineer of Tangedco to charge the HT service received under Tariff III to be charged under HT Tariff II A, and also to accept the application of the petitioner seeking one LT service connection to each of the remaining 17 towers for common facilities and charge it under LT Tariff I A. While the petitioner contended that the requirement for the common areas and the lifts was well within 112 kW, they had applied for a HT connection under Tariff III as there was no other classification.
Subsequently, the petitioner approached Tangedco seeking a revision.
However, Tangedco argued that the load requirement was more than 112 kW and hence the petitioner was advised to obtain HT service connection as per the regulations in force.
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Load requirement
“In the case of the petitioner, the power requirement is for common facilities like lift, garden area, roads, parking, etc. where there cannot essentially be a demarcation of areas for each tower. The load requirement is 1,000 kVA and therefore the service is necessarily to be a HT service,” the Commission said. It further added that under the existing categories of tariff under HT, the tariff for the common facilities in a multi-storeyed building is HT Tariff III and said it was unable to grant any relief to the petitioner with regard to the HT connection or issue directions to the Tangedco to effect LT services to each tower.
However, the Commission said it felt it was necessary to create a new category for LT purpose under HT tariff to address the grievances such as the petitioner’s in this case and directed the Tangedco to come up with a new category for such cases.
TNERC directed the Tangedco to come up with a proposal for a new category for such buildings