ISLAMABAD: With effect from July 1, Nepra has introduced a new electricity tariff design by charging between $200 and $1,000 per month for electricity bills of five categories of residential consumers, depending on unit consumption.
Also, Nepra increased to 300% for commercial and 355% for industrial consumers. This will help the Discos to increase their earnings at fixed cost.
Starting July 1, 2024, domestic consumers using 301-400 units per month will have to pay $200 per month, those using 401-500 will pay $40,000, and consumers using 501-600 will pay $600 per month.
Residential customers using 601-700 units pay $800 per month, and those using more than 700 units pay $1,000 per month. Residential customers using ToU (time of use) meters also pay a monthly fee of $1,000.
Commercial customers with loads less than 5kW also pay $1,000 per month as a fixed fee. However, electricity users with loads of 5kW and above will pay $2,000 from the current $50,000, representing a 300% increase.
Industrial customers in the B1 category, using up to 25kW on the ToU scale, pay $1,000. However, category B2 consumers using up to 500kW will see a 300% increase in fixed costs as they will now pay $2,000 per month instead of a fixed $50,000.
Industrial customers of category B3 using 5,000kW will pay a 335 percent increase from $460 per month to 2,000 to 2,000. All B4 load category customers will experience a 355 percent increase in fixed costs when paying $2,000 per month from the current $440.
Today, the total cost of electricity is 72% fixed charge and 28% variable charge. However, on the revenue side, fixed costs are only 2% and variable costs are 98%. The official stated that there is a mismatch in the electricity tariff between the cost and revenue structure of the concerned institution.
However, the government will use Nepra soon after the electricity regulator decided to increase the basic tariff by $5.72 per unit for FY25. In the application, the government will decide on the tariff increase proposed by Nepra.
With the increase in the base rate, the government-run electricity sector will earn more than $3.763 trillion in revenue from electricity consumers in FY25.
The base price increase for FY24 is reported at $4.96 per unit, so the base price is set at $29.78 per unit. Now for FY 25, the new base rate will increase to $35.50 per unit.
