Routine practice of purchasing emergency power led to losses at CEB : Ceylon Chamber of Commerce

COLOMBO (News 1st) - A study conducted by the National Agenda Committee on Energy, of The Ceylon Chamber of Commerce, stated that the routine practice of purchasing emergency power by the Central Electricity Board has led to the incurring of additional losses. The report adds, emergency power purchasing, which was expected to be used only in cases of natural calamity or long-term failure of a critical power plant, has now become a regular practice. The committee further added that emergency power has been procured from 2016 under various guises and appeared that the CEB has not in fact procured the plants listed in the approved generation plans, nor expanded their transmission network, leading to year-on-year shortages and the 2019 power crisis. It adds, several procurements were carried out on an ad-hoc basis, with varied costs, and no rationale, without properly detailed assessments of shortage, scenario analysis, and economic impact, which are the regulator’s obligations to provide in protecting the public interest. The report dictates that Sri Lanka continues to follow the least-cost,  power generation principle, embracing more coal and obsolete technology.