Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) has started exporting electricity to India as domestic production has started to rise. Although the NEA has been exporting surplus electricity to India, it is still compelled to import electricity from the neighbouring country.

NEA is still importing at least 60 MW of electricity from India daily. NEA has been importing electricity from the Tanakpur transmission line especially targeting the far western region. The number of power projects in the far west is low. However, the area has not been able to generate electricity as per the demand. NEA has not been able to supply electricity generated in other areas to the far west due to insufficient transmission lines. NEA spokesperson Suresh Bhattarai said that there is still an obligation to import electricity due to such technical problems.

"Even if we start exporting electricity to India, we are still forced to import it due to technical problems," he said.

“The far western region has not been able to generate electricity as per the demand,” he said, “So we are importing 50/60 MW electricity from Tanakpur even under normal conditions.”

However, this situation does not last long. Due to the increase in domestic production, the import of electricity will soon be stopped, he added.

NEA started exporting electricity to India from last Thursday with the increase in domestic production. NEA has been exporting 39 MW of electricity from Trishuli and Devighat hydropower projects. The Kaligandaki Hydropower Project, with a capacity of 144 MW, has been exporting an additional 140 MW of electricity since Saturday. NEA is exporting electricity to India at a maximum of Rs 19 (IRs 12) per unit.

Most of the hydropower projects in Nepal are based on river flow system. Therefore, projects run at full capacity when the river overflows during the rainy season. When the production here is high, it can be exported to India. However, when the water level in the river decreases in winter, the production decreases. At that time, NEA has been meeting the demand by importing electricity from India.

In India, with more coal-based projects, electricity can be generated as needed at any time.

However, due to recent tensions between Russia and Ukraine, power generation in India is low due to a shortage of coal. As a result, the buying and selling of electricity in India is still costly. In such situation, NEA could not get enough electricity from the Indian market for half a month. At that time, NEA had even carried out load shedding here. Now there is no need for load shedding in the country.