Hyderabad may emerge as the city with greatest energy consumption outside of NCR
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
September 17, 2020
The Central Electricity Authority’s electric power survey in its recent report provided the energy requirement projections of 45 mega cities (except NCR) in the next 10 years. As per the projections, Hyderabad may emerge as the city with greatest energy consumption in the next few years, overtaking Mumbai.
Globally, countries keep track of energy demands since it is closely linked to economic activity, income levels, GDP of a country. These trends also help in forecast of future energy needs for governments to plan based on the estimated demand. Forecasting also aids in policy formulation, tariff estimation, and optimization of peak demand in the long run. With this objective, the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) under the Ministry of Power conducts the Electric Power Survey for India, giving projections on electricity demand for the next ten years. So far, 18 such surveys have been conducted in India. The latest survey is the 19th edition which was conducted by a committee constituted by CEA in 2015.
According to a NITI Aayog’s report, India is the third largest generator and fourth biggest consumer of electricity in the world. With increasing urbanization and industrialization, the demand for power in the country is only expected to grow.
While electrification is still an ongoing process in many parts of the world including rural areas of India, urban areas alone consume around 75% of the global primary energy supply which is only expected to rise with the increasing urban population. It is in this context that the CEA’s survey which was carried out across 45 mega cities in India becomes important. A separate report was submitted for the National Capital Region (NCR).
20 mega cities covered in part-II of the survey
In part II of the survey, the report of which was released recently, 20 major cities were covered, namely- Agra, Aurangabad, Bengaluru, Gangtok, Hyderabad, Jammu, Jodhpur, Kanpur, Kolkata, Kota, Lucknow, Mumbai, Nagpur, Srinagar, Port Blair, Pune, Ranchi, Surat, Varanasi, and Vishakhapatnam. The report presents forecasts of Energy Requirement and Peak Demand across these cities.
The calculations have been done using the Partial End Use Methodology (PEUM) which has been used by CEA traditionally. Under PEUM, time series analysis as well as final energy needs of different consumers or end users such as domestic, commercial, industries, agriculture, etc. are combined. Historical data since 2003-04 furnished by DISCOMs has been used for this purpose. The projections incorporate the demands for utility systems alone. Electricity demand met by industries from captive power plants or power generated by private entities is not covered in the report.
Hyderabad would overtake Mumbai in terms of energy requirement in 2020-21
As per the report, Mumbai had the highest energy requirement with a demand of 21,475 million units (MU) in 2018-19 and 21,977 MU in 2019-20. Hyderabad was closely behind Mumbai with a requirement of 20,059 MU in 2018-19 and 21,799 in 2019-20, among these 45 cities.
These were the only cities which had an energy requirement of more than 20,000 MU in both the years. Kolkata and Bengaluru were next in line with Kolkata’s demand getting closer to 20,000 MU and Bengaluru’s requirement near 15,000 MU in 2019-20. Surat and Pune had an energy requirement of more than 10,000 MU in the same year.
As per the projections, Hyderabad is all set to overtake Mumbai in 2020-21 in terms of energy requirement. It is also expected that Hyderabad’s energy requirement will have a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.6% in the next 6 years increasing its need to more than 30,000 MU by 2024-25. Mumbai’s need is expected to rise by only around 2.3% in the next decade. The energy requirement projections of the top ten cities in the report (in terms of energy requirement) is as shown in the chart below. It can be observed that Hyderabad’s growth is the steepest.
Hyderabad’s energy requirement grew by 12.9% in the last 6 years
In terms of CAGR, Hyderabad recorded a growth of 12.9% in demand between 2013-14 and 2018-19 while Mumbai’s growth was 1.9% and was on the lower side when compared to the other mega cities. Only Kanpur recorded a negative growth of 0.65% between 2013-14 and 2018-19. The CAGR estimate for the decade, 2019-20 to 2029-30, is the highest for Ranchi with 6.8% followed by Hyderabad with 6.06%. However, Ranchi’s current requirement is 1,986 MU and is expected to rise to 3,386 MU over the next decade.
Peak demand is the highest in Mumbai as of 2019-20
Peak Demand is when the electricity consumption is the highest. For instance, in summers, the demand for electricity can soar due to increased use of Air Conditioners and Coolers. Forecasting the peak demand helps power utilities to be better prepared for increase/decrease in demand during a season.
Currently, the peak demand is the highest in Mumbai which has recorded a peak demand of 3615 MW in 2018-19. Kolkata, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad have recorded the second, third and fourth highest peaks in the same year. However, in 2019-20, Hyderabad recorded a peak demand of 3390 MW, higher than Kolkata and Bengaluru. It is projected that Hyderabad will overtake Mumbai in peak demand in 2022-23. Further, Hyderabad’s peak is also estimated to increase to 6458 MW over the next decade at a CAGR of 6.7% while that of Mumbai is estimated to increase to 4812MW at 2.6%. However, the consumption & demand figures for 2020-21 would have been drastically affected by the lockdown.
Per capita consumption is highest for Hyderabad in 2018-19
The per capita consumption of electricity for the mega cities in the survey is calculated using the 2011 census population estimates. It is observed that in 2011-12, Surat had the highest per capita consumption of electricity among the 9 cities considered. This was followed by Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Pune in the same order. In 2018-19, Hyderabad’s per capita consumption was estimated to be the highest, exceeding that of Mumbai, by almost 500 units. However, the estimates have been calculated using the 2011 census data.
Hyderabad’s major demand is for domestic purpose
In 2018-19, 35% of Hyderabad’s energy consumption was domestic, 27% industrial, and 24% commercial. Irrigation attributed for another 10%. In 2018-19, it was observed that the energy requirement of Hyderabad was 30.2% of the total energy requirement of the state of Telangana whereas its contribution in population and area were only 19.9% and 0.9% respectively.
It is projected that the city’s domestic energy requirement will increase from 6780 MU in 2019-20 to 12,726 MU in 2029-30 while the commercial requirement would increase from 4577 MU to 8590 MU during the same period. The industrial requirement is projected to increase from 5307 MU in 2019-20 to 9187 MU in 2029-30.
It will be interesting to see as to how much of this increased demand would be met from sources other than thermal & hydro. Since India is betting big on renewable sources of energy, especially solar, a substantial chunk of this demand may be met from the renewable sources.
Featured Image: Electric power survey