With the possibility of a power crisis looming large owing to the weak monsoon, the government is looking at various sources to get additional power, including “off-season generation” from sugar mills which have co-generation facility.

Around 50 sugar mills in the State generate 823.93 MW of power through co-generation during the sugarcane crushing season and most of this power is supplied to Escoms. But these mills also have the option of generating 580 MW of power by using imported coal during the off-season when sugarcane is not available for crushing. The government is now trying to convince these mills to not only generate power to their full potential during the present off-season, but also supply power to it.

Responding positively to a request made by Energy Minister D. K. Shivakumar at a meeting convened by him here on Saturday, the representatives of sugar mills agreed to constitute a technical committee to submit a proposal to the government in around 10 days on the quantum of power that could be supplied, tentative tariff and other conditions.

Payment woes

Expressing concern, the mill representatives said they had been made to run from pillar to post to get the payment for the power they had supplied earlier to Escoms. Some of them said they were yet to get payment for the power supplied earlier this year.

Remarking that they were practically made to “beg” for the payment, they urged the government to take care of these matters.

They also suggested that the government consider buying power from them on a medium- or long-term basis so that it would be economically viable.

They also claimed that other States were willing to pay a higher tariff than that offered by Karnataka and appealed that it increase the tariff.

Mr. Shivakumar said all these issues would be examined based on the proposal.