Praveer Sinha, CEO & Managing Director, Tata Power Co. Ltd, talks about demand situation, InvIT, renewable and distribution business, EV Charging points, debt and CapEx among others during an interview with Swati Khandelwal, Zee Business. Edited Excerpts:

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Q: After the lockdowns of April and May, we are seeing a pick up in the power demand across the country in June. What is the current load factor at your plant and by when do you expect demand to return to normal?

A: The demand in the power sector we are seeing has improved a lot in the last one month, which significantly reduced in April and May, especially in the first half of May. It is expected that as the industries will return to their full capacity and the commercial and other activities if the shops open up then the demand should return to its peak in June and July. It has been seen that this year already our peak went up to 180 Gigawatt and it was the peak of two years back, i.e. before the COVID in 2019 summer. The way the demand is increasing, it should go beyond 200 Gigawatt. So it is expected that full demand will come hopefully by August.

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Q: The company has also been planning to set up EV charging points. Where do the plans stand right now and at what number you are working right now?. Your debt has come down significantly last year. Can we expect any more debt reduction this year and where do you expect debt to stand by the FY22 end?

A: As far as EV is concerned, today we have reached 100 cities. EV chargers have also installed in a few places on the highways. Last year was a COVID year, which was a difficult period for everyone. Even, we were in trouble too due to it, despite that, we were able to install public EV charges at around 550 places. We have also installed more than 2,500 home charges. So, whoever buys an electric vehicle, whether it is from Tata Motors or any other manufacturer, we install the EV charger at their homes.

Along with this, we are also installing the EV Chargers at the highways. And, with this around 550 charging points, we are at the first position, as others who are installing it are standing around 40-50 EV charges yet. We expect that the number will be more than 3,000 by the year-end. So, we have huge growth plans in the EV charger and we are just not into EV Charger but also provide a very good customer experience, where the consumer gets an idea about where to charge and the time that is required for the same, where the charger is occupied and where they can block it for themselves. So, it is an excellent customer experience.

As far as the debt reduction is concerned, last year we reduced it from Rs 43,000 crore to Rs 36,000 crore and now I expect that we will stay at these levels this year as well, in spite of that we have a CapEx of around Rs 7,000 crore for this year, which will be used in the renewable projects that are being installed and the captive solutions that are being provided on the OPEX model to our commercial and industrial consumers, as well as in the solar rooftop. In addition, it will also be used in the Odisha distribution for network improvement and bringing technology and automation. So, we will have a CapEx of Rs 7,000 crore this year. Despite this, we expect that our debt level will stay at the same level.