By The Newspaper’s Staff Reporter

Copyright dawn

ISLAMABAD: Highlighting abo-ut Rs240 billion worth of additional costs to consumers owing to consistent power sector inefficiencies, the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) on Tuesday notified a negative fuel cost adjustment of Rs2.46 per unit for K-Electric and Rs1.79 per unit for other distribution companies (Discos) for September bills.

With this, the regulator also applied uniform power rates across the country on the directives of the federal government.

The reduction has come about on account of higher electricity rates charged to consumers in July under a pre-approved reference fuel rate which was actually on the lower side.

As a result, Nepra notified negative FCA for July 2025 i.e. Rs1.7856/kWh which shall be applicable to all the consumer categories of KE and Discos except lifeline consumers, protected consumers, Electric Vehicle Charging Stations (EVCS) and Pre-paid electricity consumers of all categories who opted for pre-paid tariff. These adjustments will be reflected by KE and Discos in consumers bill for September.

In addition, the KE consumers would also be entitled to 78 paise per unit negative FCA for June 2025 which had been allowed to consumers of other Discos in August but could not be applied to KE consumers during the processing of government decision for uniform FCA applicability. This would take the total negative adjustment for KE consumers to Rs2.46 per unit.

Nepra’s Member Technical Rafique Shaikh also put on record an unwanted cost of Rs238bn on consumers due to persistent governance failures in the power sector, resulting in prolonged outages, delayed project execution, and inadequate transmission planning — all directly contributing to rising generation costs and higher monthly FCA.

Published in Dawn, September 10th, 2025