The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) has issued an order in favor of wind developer Enn Enn Corp Limited which had filed a petition against the rejection of its request for renewable energy certificates (RECs) by the National Load Despatch Center (NLDC), calling it arbitrary.

The wind developer had appealed against the rejection of RECs between April and November 2017. Enn Enn Corp has three wind power generating stations in Gujarat with a cumulative installed capacity of 12.6 MW. The developer has been receiving the RECs for the electricity generated from the three wind energy generating stations in Gujarat since 2011. However, the registration had lapsed on January 2017 for projects 1 and 2, and March 2017 for project 3 and the company had applied for re-registration.

Enn Enn Corp had filed an application for the issue of RECs for the duration between April and November 2017. It has requested the NLDC to issue 19,191.196 RECs for the period ranging from January 1 to November 7, 2017. The petitioner had applied for the RECs in May 2017 for February and March 2017 for its wind power generating stations in Gujarat and had also submitted its energy injection reports (EIR).

Since the REC registration for the three projects was pending, it could not apply for RECs for the period between April and November 2017. The projects were registered in November 2017 under REC mechanism, and it had requested the NLDC to issue the following RECs:

The developer had clarified that the first two projects were eligible for the issuance of RECs until January 17, 2017, while the third was eligible for RECs until March 28, 2017. The NLDC had informed Enn Enn Corp that based on the EIR from Gujarat’s state load dispatch center, 247 RECs issued to project 1 and 506 RECs issued to project 2 had been deducted. Therefore, the NLDC committed an error in this matter.

The application for the REC could not be made by the developer when the re-registration process was going on. The NLDC has claimed that the developer is not entitled to the RECs for the period under consideration as the registration for two of its projects had expired on January 17, 2017, and the registration of the third had expired on March 28, 2017.

In its order, the central commission noted:

“If the petitioner is engaged in generation of electricity from renewable energy sources then it should be eligible for dealing in RECs if it sells the electricity generated to the distribution licensee of the area in which the eligible entity is located, at the pooled cost of power purchase of such distribution licensee as determined by the Commission or selling power to third party/open access or for generating and injecting power for captive use subject to the eligibility criteria as per the REC Regulations, 2010 as amended from time to time.”

Consequently, the commission has asked the NLDC to review the case by analyzing the energy injection reports (EIR) for the duration. According to the rules for granting RECs, Enn Enn Corp is only eligible for receiving RECs if the generated power is sold to the local distributor, or the electricity is sold to third parties or open access, or if the power is injected for captive use within the regulatory ambit.

Since Enn Enn Corp had fulfilled all of these requirements, the RECs need to be issued for power generation from January to November 2017 for the wind power projects 1 and 2; and from March to November 2017 for project 3.

The commission further underlined that the primary objective of RECs is to promote the generation of renewable energy and since in this case, there was the generation of renewable energy for the period mentioned, the request for RECs should be granted.

In April 2019, the central commission passed a similar order when it asked the national load despatch center to issue RECs for a 1.5 MW wind energy project. This petition was filed by Eingur Wind Energy Private Limited which had approached the commission about a delay of 72 days in applying for the revalidation of accreditation as an eligible entity under the REC mechanism. NLDC and Tamil Nadu Transmission Corporation Limited were the respondents in this case.

In March 2018, the central commission had issued model guidelines for the accreditation of renewable energy projects or distribution licensees by state agencies under the REC mechanism. The new procedure is designed to provide the entities with guidance on how to implement the REC mechanism.

Then recently, it issued an order extending the validity of RECs which were due to expire between April 1, 2019, and October 31, 2019, which came as a significant relief to renewable generators in the country.

Image credit: Adityamadhav83/Wikimedia Commons [CC BY-SA 4.0]

Ramya Ranganath is an Associate Editor and Writer for Mercom Communications India. Before joining Mercom, Ramya worked as a Senior Editor at a digital media supply chain solutions company. Throughout her career, she has developed end-to-end content for various companies in a wide range of domains, including renewables. Ramya holds a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from M.S. Ramaiah Institute of Technology and is passionate about environmental issues and permaculture.