Staff Reporter :
Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) will hold public hearing from next month over the proposal to raise electricity tariff afresh.
Sources said, the public hearing will be held from November 28 to December 3 at the TCB Auditorium in Dhaka.
“We have already received proposals for price adjustment of electricity from the Power Development Board (PDB) and other power distribution companies. Receipt upon their proposals, the BERC has fixed the date of public hearing,” A BERC official told The New Nation yesterday.
He said, the Commission will announce the new electricity pricing after the hearing. On November 28 (Thursday), from 10am to 1pm, the BERC will hear the public opinions over the proposed electricity pricing of the Power Development Board, and from 2pm to 5pm, it will hear on the proposed transmission pricing changes of the Power Grid Company of Bangladesh (PGCB).
The hearing on the proposed pricing of power distribution companies will be held from December 1 to December 3 to increase the consumer-level electricity tariff.
On October 23, the state-owned PDB sent a proposal to BERC to increase the power tariff at bulk and retail level.
According to the PDB proposal, it is necessary to raise additional Tk 8,608 crore from the power tariff hike to cover losses suffered from purchasing electricity from costly rental and quick rental power plants.
PDB in its proposal said that it will earn Tk 36,600 crore from the sale of electricity in 2020, but it will require Tk 45,208 crore to purchase electricity from rental and quick rental power plants.
At the same time, DESCO, DPDC, NESCO, REB and Ozopadico proposed to BERC to make fresh adjustment of electricity transmission charge.
The distribution companies urged the Commission to consider increasing the retail price of electricity from January 2020, citing increase in their operating costs. But they did not mentioned how much the tariff should be increased.
The government on November 23, 2017, last hiked electricity tariff at consumers level.
