Other Finalists : Power Exchange India : Online Bidding System for Indian Power Markets

There is a lot of untapped power from Captive Power Producers and Independent

Power Producers ). This capacity can be tapped to meet the power shortage in

India. There was a need to grow this market by providing a platform to all

market participants including State Electricity Boards to toy the idea of buying

available power through a transparent price discovery mechanism to meet its

demands. Also there is a huge demand/ supply gap at geographical level,

requiring a market where surpluses can be disposed off efficiently on a

real-time basis to optimise resource allocation on short-term basis. Central

Electricity Regulatory Commission, being the power markets regulator initiated

reforms by introducing 'Open Access', in which utilities (generation,

transmission or distribution companies were given permission to utilise the

available capacities of a power transmission, distribution system or a

associated facilities in the country. As a result, power exchange platform was

conceptualized to allow power trading.

Power Exchange went for in-house development of power exchange to meet the

Indian power market requirements. With support from its group company NSE.IT,

PXIL developed the entire solution in less than six months.

The trading/ bidding platform of the project provides a neutral platform to

receive orders/ bids from each buyer and seller, match its bids (using a

matching algorithm) for determining the best price and the corresponding

quantity/ volume at the best prices. The bids would be matched based on price,

volume and time. The matching engine would run an algorithm to derive schedules

to be cleared. The clearing of these schedules would be done by the grid

operator and communicated to respective buyers and sellers during the defined

timeslots. The matched trades would then be stored in database for long term

retention. Project also has a risk management system which manages the day to

day financial risks on a trading system. The system would entail seeking

operating margins and online clearing of funds, pay-in from buyers and pay-out

to sellers through online connectivity with the clearing banks authorised to

operate with the Power Exchange. The risk management system ensures that there

are no payment defaults and that the buy and sell on the Power Exchange is

harmonically achieved.

According to PXIL, currently transaction of an average volume of 3 million

units of power is done on a daily basis. Also with the planned load forecast,

each state would be able to improve the overall power availability within the

state.