The All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) Federal Executive meeting held here on Saturday passed 10 resolutions with the main demands being the withdrawal of the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 and the integration of all unbundled electric utilities.

The meeting was chaired by Shailendra Dubey, President of AIPEF, and Secretary General P. Rathnakar Rao and was attended by the Presidents and Secretaries General of all of AIPEF’s constituent electrical engineering associations. The meeting also discussed at length the current energy crisis in the country resulting from the shortage of coal and the privatization policies carried out by the Center and some state governments in the electricity sector.

On the ongoing energy crisis, the Corps of Engineers has called for an independent investigation into the shortage of coal and demanded the withdrawal of instructions/conditions issued by the Center to State Governments (Gencos) on the import of coal for blending with native coal. They also demanded the state government to withdraw the privatization of their electric utilities and demanded the cancellation of the proposals for the privatization of the Union Territory electric utilities without finalizing the tender documents. standard offers.

In addition, the AIPEF executive meeting called for the revision of power purchase agreements (PPAs), the removal of conditions imposed on states on the installation of high-cost (prepaid) smart energy meters, reviving the old pension scheme for all electrical employees and engineers and stopping privatization. of the Electricity Department of Pondicherry.

The AIPEF meeting suggested a modification of the Renewable Energy Purchase Obligation (RPPO) indicating that it should be based on guaranteeing grid stability, the ecological aspects of solar energy and the manufacture of local solar equipment and the development of other renewable energy sources.

The Federation of Electrical Engineers was of the view that the proposal to give consumers choice of supply by amending the Electricity Act went against the interests of lower social strata and sections such as farmers and community professions and that it required large investments in metering, computerized energy accounting and computer-based loss assessment, which they claim will not exist in the country at present . Citing an example from the UK, they said huge investments had been made in the transmission and distribution network before giving consumers choice of supply.

Regarding the coal crisis, the meeting attributed the problem to the mishandling of the situation by Coal India-Government of India and alleged that the coal import policies formulated were aimed at directly benefiting private companies and citing a report by Bloomberg, they said rising coal prices helped Adani Enterprises post a 30% increase in profits for the quarter ending March 2022, the highest in six quarters, for example.