Plus


10th August 1997

Sports

Home Page Front Page OP/ED News Business


Save on electricity bills

With a price hike in the offing CEB moves to offer consumers a way out. Tharuka Dissanayake reports...

From September 1, the new electricity tariffs will come into effect and all customers will be paying 11 percent more for the electricity they use. For the public this may seem another unbearable cost to their overburdened purses, but the Ceylon Electricity Board claims that the increase is minimal considering the costs expended by them in various projects to supply power to all customers. Even though the general opinion of the CEB is at a low ebb now, with a public brooding over the prospect of raised electricity bills, a certain branch of the Board is aiming to help people reduce their bills by careful consumption of electricity.

The Demand- Side Management Branch of the CEB came into being in 1995, with the aim of promoting energy efficiency with global trends moving towards that direction. Demand-Side Management is all about what happens on the consumer’s side of the electric meter, how one wisely uses the electricity supplied to them, stimulated by the supplier, in this case the CEB. In most European countries, power supply is in excess of the demand, but yet conservation methods are strongly implemented, mainly for environmental reasons. It is common knowledge that the generation of electricity, in almost every instance causes some kind of pollution and this is the biggest concern of energy management.

For the Ceylon Electricity Board, the need to conserve electric power has arisen for many reasons. One is as spelt out above, the need to cause as little damage to the environment as possible. The other and more immediate reason is reducing the demand on the system which is already straining to meet the peak demand of consumers. That our electricity supply is not in keeping with growth or demand is nothing new. Therefore more and more projects need to be commissioned urgently if the demand for electricity is to be met. “By saving the energy generated by the present system, maybe we could push back the next power projects by a few years,” M.S. Jayalath, Deputy General Manger, Demand Side Management Branch said. He said that this would mean a great advantage for the entire country for a large amount of foreign exchange is spent on the construction of new plants and fuel needed to run them, which in the future would be coal or diesel.

The Branch concentrates on promoting the use of Compact Fluorescent lamps among householders. These use only 20 percent of the electricity consumed by a normal lamp to give the same light and also last much longer. Industries that consume large quotas of electricity will get more detailed and personalised services on how to manage energy more efficiently.

From the viewpoint of the consumer the obvious advantage would be reduced monthly electricity bills, which is good news for most of us. Saving of electricity bills can be achieved by many methods, and the CEB’s Demand Side Management team is now equipped to inform people of how they can bring down their bills.

Electricity tariffs are categorised as Domestic, Industrial and Commercial. Already the DSM Branch has worked on several factories and public institutions. Surveys are done by CEB engineers on the factory or building and ways and means of efficient energy use is figured out. Thereafter the company has to decide whether they wish to implement the recommendations made by the CEB team. Here a number of factors are taken into consideration. The company might have to replace equipment and/ or invest in capacitors and energy saving devices. For this, new capital is needed. The National Development Bank and Development Finance Credit Corporation are liasing with this unit of the CEB to provide low interest loans to companies launching on this scheme to lower their electricity consumption. The CEB calculates the rate of return, on the basis of reduced electricity bills, which in most factories run into millions of rupees. Usually a project is good if the investment on the changes made could be recovered in four years. After that the saving would be a profit for the company. “Usually companies recover their cost in two or three years,” Jayalath said. The survey, which initially came free of charge is now priced at Rs. 8500.

The Branch had replaced the lighting at the Dalada Maligawa with compact fluorescent lamps. The lighting at the Parliament too was changed thus and their savings on electric bills amount to some Rs. 1.7 million a year. Hotel Taj Samudra has also set a precedent in the hospitality circles by adopting energy saving measures. Their compact fluorescent lamps are not only cost effective but also easy to maintain since they have a long life time and frequent bulb changing is not required.

On the domestic front, the work is just beginning. The CEB is launching a programme whereby householders can purchase four compact fluorescent lamps from any of the listed retailers with a special voucher issued by the CEB and pay back in twelve monthly instalments which will be added to the consumer’s electricity bill. “A pilot project of this scheme has been successful in Kotte area,” Jayalath said. “The monthly installment will be less than the saving on the bill.” Very soon the scheme will implemented in the Western Province South area. By the end of 1998, the CEB hopes to spread the use of compact flourescents among the entire 1.5 million domestic clients in the country. The vouchers will be available at CEB offices and even LECO customers could participate. From August 15, as a result of lengthy lobbying with the Treasury, the compact flourescent lamps will be available to the public at duty free prices.

In an earlier scheme the CEB was able to distribute100000 compact fluorescent lamps, which they claim has reduced the demand by 5 MW and saves 7.5 million units per annum. Householders could also manage their electrical appliances like fridges, freezers, kettles, cookers, geyzers in a more efficient manner. More details could be obtained in leaflet form from CEB offices. The team also stresses the need to standardise the electrical equipment imported to Sri Lanka. Many cheap Asian brands are available alongside more expensive Japanese or European models of appliances. Most of the cheaper brands are very poor in efficiency and therefore in the long term customers lose on their electricity bills . The Energy Conservation Fund of the Ministry for Power and Energy is now working with the Sri Lanka Standards Institution to classify each model of electrical appliances by giving them an efficiency rating, beginning with refrigerators and air conditioners.

In future they also plan to introduce standards for buildings with the co-operation of the UDA, so that new buildings will incorporate energy efficiency in their very conception. By year 2000 they hope to make this type of standardisation a regulation in the UDA act.

Meanwhile the Branch with the aid of various International Aid Agencies is launching research on electricity consumption patterns in houses to determine ways of tackling householders and teaching the public to make best use of their electricity.

Continue to Plus page 4- A Caesarean rapture * The blue baby * Goodbye Bombay

Return to the Plus contents page

Read Letters to the Editor

Go to the Plus Archive

| TIMESPORTS

| HOME PAGE | FRONT PAGE | EDITORIAL/OPINION | NEWS / COMMENT | BUSINESS

Please send your comments and suggestions on this web site to
info@suntimes.is.lk or to
webmaster@infolabs.is.lk