Why Sri Lankans fear development

Originally appeared on The Morning

By Dhananath Fernando

The three types of fears we endure as a country

Fear is a universal emotion and we have all come across three major types of fear in our lives. The fear of failure is the most common one that often paralyses us and prevents us from taking action. The fear of success is a lesser-known fear that keeps us from achieving our goals. Finally, the fear of judgement causes us to fear being evaluated by others.

Unfortunately, in Sri Lanka, the fear of reform has encroached upon all three of these personal fears. In public policy, there are currently three primary fears:

Fear of reforming State-Owned Enterprises

It is no secret that Sri Lanka’s State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) have been one of the main reasons for the country’s economic crisis. Everyone agrees that SOEs need to be reformed, but there are different opinions on how to do it. Some believe that the losses are mainly due to corruption of politicians and political influence against reforming SOEs. Others believe that with capable management, SOEs can become profitable.

However, in my opinion, the absence of competent people to run State institutions and corruption are both symptoms of the absence of a market system.

In a market system, the focus is on making profits and minimising corruption. However, it doesn’t mean everything is perfect; rather, it is geared to minimise corruption and maximise profits. Therefore, opening up the market can help solve this issue.

One key fear that is brought forward is the risk of high prices when the markets are opened. However, based on our experience, prices decrease with the opening of markets and the allowing of more competition.

For instance, Sri Lanka’s telecommunications prices are some of the lowest in the region and the entry of Lanka IOC into the fuel market did not increase prices. On the other hand, the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) incurred losses and it had to pass these on to taxpayers. Its losses of Rs. 632 billion over eight months in 2022 will have to be borne by the people of Sri Lanka through the contribution of about Rs. 28,000 per person.

It is evident that the absence of a market system is one reason for the profits not being sustainable, so we always drift back to where we started. The losses of the CPC for the first eight months of 2022 are greater than the allocation for both health and education together, which is about Rs. 550 billion.

Such high losses are indicative that all loss-making institutes, including the CPC, SriLankan Airlines, and the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB), should be restructured to reduce the burden on the Treasury and thereby the taxpayer.

The focus is not only on prices but also on the quality and accessibility of the service. In the past, during fuel shortages, people paid Rs. 1,000 per litre on the black market. Therefore, simply claiming that the Government can provide fuel at a lower price is not very logical. We need a Sri Lanka where people can afford and decide what they want to use rather than the Government deciding what we should do. This is the Sri Lanka we envision.

Regulation is crucial and the Government needs to create a regulatory framework to ensure a level playing field. The current Public Utilities Commission Act has provisions, but we need to move towards a competition commission to ensure fair competition.

Fear of competition

The second fear among Sri Lankans is the fear of competition. We consider competition as one person winning and the other person losing. However, it is a formula where both sides can win. The fear of competition mainly arises in global trade and we often wish to block our competition by imposing high tariffs. However, this has been detrimental to Sri Lankans and to our businesses and we need to move past this fear.

It is also important to remember that competition is the key to maximising consumer welfare. Competition brings in choice to the market and leads to competitive prices. Simultaneously, it incentivises firms to optimise their processes and functions – the key to remaining competitive and profitable. Therefore, competition should be thought of as a win-win scenario where firms are incentivised to optimise their operations and grow while consumers enjoy maximised welfare.

3. Fear of imagining a prosperous Sri Lanka

It is understandable to have concerns and fears about the transition to a more prosperous Sri Lanka, especially when it involves a shift away from a State-dependent model. However, it is important to recognise that a prosperous Sri Lanka can bring many benefits and opportunities for its citizens.

A prosperous Sri Lanka can create jobs and provide opportunities for entrepreneurship and innovation. It can also attract foreign investment and contribute to the growth of the economy. With a thriving economy, the Government will have more resources to invest in areas such as education, healthcare, and infrastructure, which can lead to an overall improvement in the quality of life for its citizens.

It is also important to acknowledge the role of the private sector in providing essential services and goods, as well as contributing to the growth of the economy. While the Government has a role to play in ensuring the safety and wellbeing of its citizens, it is often the private sector that drives innovation and progress.

As Helen Keller once said, avoiding danger does not necessarily lead to safety in the long run. It is important to face our fears and embrace change, even if it is uncomfortable at first. With the right mindset and a willingness to adapt, a prosperous Sri Lanka can be within reach.

The opinions expressed are the author’s own views. They may not necessarily reflect the views of the Advocata Institute or anyone affiliated with the institute.

New electricity tariff structure leaves room for considerable improvement

Originally appeared on the Daily Mirror, Timesonline.lk

By the Resident Fellow of Advocata Institute

The recent revision of electricity tariffs is a step towards reducing the fiscal burden caused by the supply of electricity below its cost of production. While the new tariff structure is an improvement on the previous one, anomalies remain.

 In determining tariffs, there are three characteristics of electricity that must be noted:

I. Electricity is a commodity that is interchangeable, both in its generation and use. One megawatt hour (MWh) of electricity produced from coal or hydropower contains the same amount of energy. Different categories of users consume the same product.

II. It must be produced and used simultaneously. Electricity storage is still prohibitively expensive. Supply must meet demand exactly in the power grid.

III. The cost of supplying electricity fluctuates throughout the day, depending on the power generation mix, cost of fuels used, transmission costs and energy losses.

As electricity is a commodity, there should be no difference in the prices charged to different users. The tariff should also reflect the varying cost of supply, depending on the time of day and should as far as possible, balance the generation of electricity with its use. For sustainability, the tariff needs to be on a cost-recovery basis.

The new tariff addresses some of the shortcomings of the existing structure but there is still considerable room for improvement.

1. The proposed structure reduces the discrimination between different types of bulk supply customers.

For users below 42kVA, the different rates that were charged to hotels, government and general-purpose bulk supply, have been amalgamated into a single general-purpose tariff but a lower rate remains applicable to ‘industrial’ customers. However, it is positive that the differential between the general-purpose bulk supply and customers categorised as ‘industrial’ has decreased.

For larger bulk customers, it is welcome that the distinction between categories has been done away with and a single tariff, close to cost recovery and reflecting time of use, has been applied.

The Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) consultation document states that the average cost of generation is Rs.32.87 but the tariff charged to low-use industrial users (Rs.20) and low-use general-purpose customers (Rs.25 for those below 180kWh) is both below cost.

The only justification for a discriminatory tariff is for a lifeline tariff for the poor. While the domestic users below 90kWh do receive a subsidised tariff, the domestic consumers, who exceed this, pay the highest tariff (Rs.50 for usage between 90-180kWh, Rs.75 above 180kWh), which is almost double that of all bulk users. Thus, high-use domestic consumers are subsidising industrial and commercial users.

Moreover, instead of increasing the rate for each block of use, the moment domestic customers exceed 60 units, the tariff increases from an average of Rs.9 to Rs.16. A customer, who consumes 59 units, will pay Rs.9 but one who consumes 61 units will pay Rs.16 per unit. This is unfair and can promote corruption in meter reading. In general, such cross subsidies are undesirable, as they can lead to inefficient resource allocation or have unintended consequences.

For example, the higher domestic tariff may serve as a disincentive for remote work. Remote or flexible work arrangements can reduce transport costs, congestion, energy use and for some, enable a better work/life balance. The government should be facilitating flexible work but the higher rates applicable to some domestic consumers may be a disincentive.

The PUCSL has an unusual definition of industry. It includes, ‘agriculture’, ‘forestry and fishing’, ‘mining and quarrying’, ‘manufacturing’, ‘electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply’, ‘water supply, sewerage and waste management. As a matter of principle, the producer should not make judgment on how the product is used or attempt to encourage or discourage particular activities through prices. If the government does wish to encourage particular industries, it is more efficient to do this through a transparent system of grants, rather than distorting prices.

Economic activity is increasingly complex and a value chain can involve many different sectors. For example, the tea industry involves agriculture, processing in factories, transport, warehousing, blending, financing, marketing and exports. Moreover, products are now more knowledge intensive, so a greater part of the value addition arises in non-production-oriented components of the value chain. With differential tariffs, parts of the same value chain may pay different prices for use of the same commodity.

Religious and charitable bodies continue to enjoy preferential treatment under the domestic tariff category but there is a small decrease in the discount offered to these bodies. High-use customers in this category should also be subject to a time of use (TOU)-based tariff. Advocata reiterates that there should be no price discrimination between users; at most there should be two categories, households and businesses.

2. It is welcome to note that the new tariff structure extends the TOU tariff to the agriculture subsector but this should be extended to smaller bulk users and made compulsory for the high-use domestic category. For customers using solar power on a net metering basis, the export and import tariffs should be based on TOU. A TOU-based tariff reflects the changing cost of generation across the day. Generation during peak hours relies more heavily on thermal power, which is more costly. Tariffs charged to customers should reflect this, so that the consumers are incentivised to shift demand to off-peak hours.

3. The new tariff maintains a lower rate for low-use domestic customers and it is welcome that the new structure applies marginal tariffs based on different slabs of usage. The previous system was inherently unfair to the consumer; the new tariff removes this anomaly.

4. The decision to charge for street lighting, which should be paid for by the local authorities, is welcome. Previously, as the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) did not charge for street lighting, the local authorities, which have control over when the lights are switched on and off, had no particular incentive to switch off street lights during day time. A lower rate for street lighting is justified because the major part of the use falls into off-peak hours.

5. It is regrettable that the PUCSL permitted the CEB to compel selected clients to pay for electricity in US dollars. This is a step towards forced dollarisation of payments and is precluded under Section 4 of Monetary Law Act No. 58 of 1949. The proposal is meant to address the current shortage of US dollars for importation of fuel for the energy sector. However, this would only divert resources from other alternative users and may not be the most efficient way of allocating the scarce foreign exchange in the country. It would be preferable to allow US dollars to flow into the banking sector (by removing any restrictions and requirements such as forced conversions and surrendering requirements) and for those funds to be allocated based on price (exchange rate).

The increase in the electricity tariff is unavoidable but will impose an additional burden on consumers. Therefore, it is imperative that this must be accompanied by increased transparency and efficiency

within the utility.

Consumers may expect to pay for higher world prices but cannot be expected to pay higher costs, due to inefficiency, waste or corruption. State enterprises need to be open and transparent in their affairs, particularly in procurement and where possible should operate in competitive markets.

As a first step, the CEB should provide a detailed breakdown on the components of its tariff:

• Energy costs: (Own generation costs and that paid to the private generation companies). This must be broken down into the fuel cost and the costs of operating the power stations, such as the manpower and maintenance costs as well as the capital cost of the stations.

• Network costs: This reflects the cost of transporting electricity through the power grid.

• Overhead: This is to recover the costs of central administration, billing and meter reading, data management, retail market systems as well as market development initiatives.

The opinions expressed are the authors’ own views. They may not necessarily reflect the views of the Advocata Institute.

The first test of the President’s ‘power’

In this weekly column on The Sunday Morning Business titled “The Coordination Problem”, the scholars and fellows associated with Advocata attempt to explore issues around economics, public policy, the institutions that govern them and their impact on our lives and society.

Originally appeared on The Morning

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By Dhananath Fernando

Power cuts in Sri Lanka are not a recent phenomenon. However, this phenomenon is going to be repeated over and over if we fail to find a sustainable solution. The media reported that during the 2019 blackouts, senior officials in the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) had to beg the rain gods with a special “poojawa” to fill our reservoirs faster as they ran out of any other option. As reported by media, pressure mounted to a level that the then President was very disappointed with their performance and requested that the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) and CEB agree on a common plan.

It is clear that the energy problem in Sri Lanka is extremely complicated. This problem has no simple solution, as structural constraints, economic limitations, technological drawbacks, and many other complications continue to ravage Sri Lanka’s energy sector. The current President has received a mandate for a “system change”. How he solves this problem will be a litmus test on his administration. His approach and ability to solve this complicated public policy problem will determine whether such an ambitious “system change” is possible.

Understanding the context

The uniqueness of electricity is that we cannot store it on a grand scale – until the world comes up with a cost-effective battery storage solution. This places the CEB in a challenging position, as it has to walk a fine line between undersupplying and oversupplying power to the country, without an option to store electricity and manage shortfalls. In other words, all electricity that is produced has to be met by demand, and the CEB has to have a constant supply available, as it would be impossible to predict electricity demand down to the last unit. If the electricity demand is higher than what is generated, the grid becomes unstable. Producing more electricity than is demanded will make it difficult to manage the grid. It would also be very expensive as our electricity supply comes from multiple sources such as hydro, coal, thermal, and few renewable energy sources.

When demand increases, we can’t just activate a power station and supply electricity to the grid, as activating some power plants, setting up the temperature, and resetting the grid takes a few days. That is one reason as to why the CEB requires a few days to overcome this situation with the Norochcholai Plant becoming dysfunctional. Even with low power demand due to the contraction of economic activity such as tourism and some industrial plants, resetting the grid without Norochcholai and managing the capacity with other plants takes a few days. To put it simply, the CEB does not have an easy task at hand. The most economical form of generating electricity is hydropower where the cost per unit is about Rs. 6. We cannot match demand only through hydropower, however, and we have to activate our coal power plants during peak hours when demand rises. The unit cost of coal-generated electricity is approximately Rs. 17.50 per unit and Rs. 25-35 is the unit cost of thermal-generated electricity. According to energy specialist Dr. Tilak Siyambalapitiya, the overall cost of production of a unit of electricity is Rs. 23.32 and the approved selling price is Rs. 16.29. In other words, our selling price only covers about 70% of the generation cost. The important fact is that the cost for each unit we consume is not the same; the cost of the energy we consume during peak hours from 6 p.m.- 1 p.m. is more, as it is mainly generated from thermal and coal.

Sri Lanka’s cost per electricity unit is comparatively high compared to our neighbours like Kerala, Tamil Nadu, India, and Bangladesh. But one real reason for the cost to be lower in these countries is they have blackouts during peak hours without activating their thermal and coal plants, and households have adapted to face blackouts with some capital investments such as battery power and installing inverters. In Sri Lanka, the economic cost of a blackout would be significantly higher than supplying power through coal, thermal, and renewable energy sources. Hence, our cost is high for a multitude of reasons.

The composition of Sri Lanka’s grid is based on domestic consumption, making our peak demand hours in the evenings between 6 p.m.-10 p.m. In contrast, countries with greater industrial development have peak demand hours during daytime working hours. Additionally, in Sri Lanka, there is a tug of war between the regulator, the PUCSL, and electricity supplier, the CEB, on developing a long-term power generation plan and maintaining our power mix. As a result of this cold war, not a single power plant has been commissioned to be built during the last Government. It is rather unfortunate that Sri Lanka’s inability to come to a timely consensus on solutions for this chronic issue has continued to weigh down our national potential.

The CEB monopoly

The CEB has an absolute monopoly in power generation, distribution, development, and technology implementation. It’s a monopoly within a non-tradable sector. They have blocked everyone else and kept complete control.

Even though power generation and power stations have been contracted to suppliers of renewable energy in the private sector, they too fall under the CEB’s control. It was reported multiple times by the media that the CEB buys power from private energy suppliers at a high cost, causing colossal losses for the CEB.

It’s a mafia ecosystem between bureaucrats and the private sector. The more thermal power we buy, the more beneficial it is for the cartel members to make more money. The grid and cable network is also maintained (generation, transmission, and distribution) by the CEB with no competition, making it completely inefficient.

When questioning the CEB on its colossal losses, one common excuse provided by all governments is that the CEB sells units of power at a cheap rate so that all Sri Lankans have access to electricity. However, it is important to note that if the CEB makes a loss, it would be indirectly passed to the taxpayer anyway, as no CEB official or parliamentarian pays the losses from their private money. Our cost of power has a greater impact on Sri Lanka’s investments, and its ability to get faster connectivity to the grid is one main parameter in the “Ease of Doing Business Index” compiled by the World Bank (WB).

The CEB’s losses have also extended into the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC). In the past, the CPC stated that they would stop the supply of fuel if the CEB fails to settle its debts. This continues to be an ongoing battle. Both the CEB’s and CPC’s losses are passed onto taxpayers, even though their claim that our electricity is reasonably prices is a flawed argument and proves to be counterproductive, given that our energy prices are not reasonable when compared to the region. 

Over the years, it was reported that a grant from the Asian Development Bank provided $ 17 million in 2012 to modernise the System Control Centre (SCC), which is the main control centre for managing demand and supply of electricity.

Even though an SCC is the heart of managing electricity demand and supply and stabilising the grid, it took Sri Lanka more than a decade to execute this decision. The CEB, a state corporation with an asset base of Rs. 500 billion, being unable to finance crucial infrastructure development such as the SCC is indicative of a culture of inefficiency and ineffectiveness that is inherently ingrained within monopolies.

One of the main promises of H.E. the President is creating an e-government system and digitising government systems and processes. If the Government is serious about this, installing smart meters as soon as possible under the digitisation programme must be a key consideration. With the installation of smart meters, a significant cost for the CEB would be reduced. In an age where our bank card is connected to a mobile-based platform, where private buses are in discussion about a smart card, can we as a country still afford to have a system where an officer has to visit every household in Sri Lanka to check the electricity meter and provide a bill? Especially in an energy market where the cost of the unit changes based on the period of the year and as per the time of electricity usage? Introducing smart meters will not be a popular solution, but a system change cannot be achieved without making unpopular decisions!

Possible solutions

The problems at hand have many tiers. The main barriers for reforms are structural. While operational and human resource-related reforms can be undertaken, without structural reforms, the operational issues and human resource issues sustainably fixed will continue to be chronic weaknesses.

Structural changes

With the Imposing, a strict leadership style or rolling heads at the senior level of bureaucracy in the energy sector will not be productive given the structural problems that exist. In fact, it will most likely worsen the situation if dealt with in this manner.

As a first step, the monopoly held by the CEB must be un-entangled and straightened out. The ecosystem of corruption, inefficiency, and malpractices has to be exposed to competition, with players entering the market.

There are multiple options to do this, and we have to unbundle the monopoly of power generation, transmission, and distribution as the first step. This will be a major structural change. To ensure competition, in the long run, a competition law has to be established which will not only be beneficial to the power and energy sector but for all Sri Lankan monopolies.

Opening energy for trading

Since Sri Lanka is an island, we are not in a position to trade energy, as our grid is not connected to any other energy market. Even if we generate a surplus of energy, we cannot trade, and in an emergency, we do not have the capacity to manage a sudden shortage.

One suggestion by Prof. Rohan Samarajiva in a report compiled under the chairmanship former Central Bank Governor Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy and handed over to H.E. the President is to connect Sri Lanka’s grid to the South Indian grid through an HVDC (High Voltage DC) cable.

Energy trading is already in place between Bhutan and India, and Bhutan is a net energy exporter and their energy cost is very low as their generation is mainly from hydropower due to their unique mountains and geography. This has to be taken up at the highest level with negotiations bilaterally if we are aspiring to be part of a big energy market and if we are serious about being a hub for energy in the Indian Ocean.

In an era of uncertainty and supply chain diversification, it is not a bad idea to move ahead from a simple self-sufficiency mentality to a mentality of generating a surplus and aiming to become competitive within the energy industry.

While we work on these long-term solutions, we have to make sure to build the necessary power plants in the short run to manage our energy supply, while diversifying towards renewable energy sources.

The energy mafia is so large and sometimes they work by planting big ideas that are backed by self-interest of the key decision-makers, including H.E. the President.

If we continue to think in isolation and settle for mediocre options yet again, we will just be postponing the problem before us. Our President has the rare opportunity to fulfil his mandate of a “system change” and tangibly change the system by reforming the energy sector. Alternatively, he could take the easy road by postponing any serious tackling of the problem. I hope the Government will have the courage to change the system, instead of giving into pressure.

By implementing this reform, the Government will be working towards bringing the average Sri Lankan out of the figurative darkness of the nation’s long-running electricity crisis.

The opinions expressed are the author’s own views. They may not necessarily reflect the views of the Advocata Institute or anyone affiliated with the institute.

Monster monopolies

In this weekly column on The Sunday Morning Business titled “The Coordination Problem”, the scholars and fellows associated with Advocata attempt to explore issues around economics, public policy, the institutions that govern them and their impact on our lives and society.

Originally appeared on The Morning

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By Dilshani N Ranawaka

Rukshani, is a small business owner running her own grocery store. Her peak hours of business are when everyone gets back home from their jobs around 7-8pm after working in Colombo. Unfortunately, she has been struggling to make ends meet as of late, due to power cuts that are also scheduled in her area around the same time as her peak hours. With just candles lit during these hours, refrigerators and coolers switched off, it adds an additional cost for her to operate her business.

Thilina, who works in Colombo faces a challenge of getting back home as the workers of the Railway Authority have decided to go on strike asking for a pay raise. Even though trains are over-crowded, they are unfortunately the fastest way of commuting back and forth. Alternatively, Thilina has to resort to the next best solution in his capacity; buses, which incurs an additional cost to reach home.

How is that Rukshani and Thilina have no say over the situation? Why does Rukshani have to suffer losses during the peak hours of her business and why should Thilina have to look for alternative transportation for something they are capable of paying, but somehow is beyond their control?

Trains and electricity are two vital services for the day to day functioning of the country. Why do these authorities continue to function when they are failing to provide reliable and efficient services to their customers who pay for these services? They have a monopoly over this service, hence they exploit it.

As of 2017, Sri Lanka Railway (SLR) sums up for Rs. 7.5 billion in losses. The Central Electricity Board (CEB) projects of Rs. 89 billion in losses for 2019. An island-wide poll by Sparkwinn Research, commissioned by Advocata Institute indicates that 81% of the sampled population are not satisfied with the performance of the State Owned Enterprises (SOEs). As the numbers have spoken, people are clearly not in favour of having these underperforming SOEs.

Would a private institute still run under these terrible, burdening losses?

The issue mainly starts with the monopolistic control over services complemented with organized trade unions within these public institutions. The fact that these services do not have competition, offers a fundamental background for wage increases and other demands that usually result in strikes which influences the entire population.

The initiation of these services dates back to the years when the private sector had inadequate resources to facilitate these services. In such conditions, the government established these entities for the benefit of the population. However, due to the monopolistic nature of these establishments, workers were able to unionize forcing the government to lose control over these institutions.

To add on to the burden of failures, is the fact that all these are controlled and heavily subsidized by the government. The lack of incentives to improve their efficiency and productivity are therefore felt heavily by the government.

There are common practices of addressing the issues on monopolies of the economy. Incentivizing merger policies, regulating and controlling the quality of these monopolies and price caps are some of the methods developed countries use to provide better services.

The “P” word; “privatization” is a taboo in Sri Lanka, although it is commonly agreed that the process of privatization paves the way towards an answer to address these issues that burden the entire economy.

“Privatization” in Sri Lanka is identified as “transferring an institute from public ownership towards private ownership”. This is only one such form of privatisation and is known as a “complete privatization”.  However, there exists various forms of privatizations such as transferring assets, Public-Private Partnerships and franchising.

Path towards privatization

The process of privatization should be methodological. Montreal Review (an independent online magazine) identifies few principals that would lead to an efficient privatization process.

1. The purpose of privatisation

2. The need to review different methods of privatisation

3. The extent of the privatisation

4. Recognising constraints

5. Finding a buyer

6. Implementing an investor friendly environment to attract investors

How the United Kingdom excelled in their privatization process of trains and telecom are case studies which could be replicated in Sri Lanka. The United States government remained in control of quality control and maintaining standards while the operations were handled by private sectors. On the other hand, the United States had successfully privatised industries with natural monopolies such as water and electricity supply by the privatization of operations with the government remaining in control of providing the role of maintaining standards while removing excess burden on the budgets.

However, given the extensive amount of State Owned Enterprises (SOEs), an initial step towards privatization could be to list down possible institutions or even better, towards creating an index which could be a measurement towards qualifying for privatization process.

Can we breakdown these natural monopolies? Are monopolies simply an excuse that gives the governors the luxury of political lobbying? Something to think about.

“The very term “public consumption products” is an absurd one. Every good is useful “to the public”, and almost every good may be considered “necessary”. Any designation of a few industries as “public utilities or services” is completely arbitrary and unjustified”  - Murray Rothbard, a prestigious American Economist.

Reforming Sri Lanka’s power sector

By Ravi Ratnasabapathy

 The article originally appeared in the Daily News.

Electricity was introduced to Ceylon by a private company in 1895, but since 1927, with the formation of the Department of Government Electrical Undertakings the industry has been a vertically integrated state monopoly.

The electricity infrastructure comprises generation, transmission and distribution. Transmission refers to the bulk transfer of electricity from power plants to substations located near demand centres. Distribution is the delivery of power to consumers from substations.

Some reform of the industry took place during the 1980's and 1990's. LECO, a state owned private company established in 1983 to undertake the distribution of power in Kotte. Independent Power Producers (IPPs) and small hydro developers entered the industry in the mid1990s when generation was opened to private investors following a severe power crisis in 1996.

Since 2004 policy reverted to state-lead investment with the exception of small renewable power projects. The CEB reports regular losses, is heavily indebted and has invested billions but does Sri Lanka have an efficient and economic system of electricity supply, the stated mission of the CEB?

The disaster that is the coal power plant is well known and provides good reason to reassess the long term plans for the provision of power.

Before examining long term solutions there are immediate problems that need to be addressed so some short-term measures are necessary. A peculiarity of Sri Lanka's electricity demand is the high evening peak load. A steep increase in demand occurs between 6pm-7pm which then peaks from 7pm-8pm. Thereafter demand gradually eases over the following three hours.

Peak demand is about 50% higher than average demand and coping with this presents the most urgent problem for the CEB. A study by the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) in 2012 recommended that “aggressive action is still required to curb further growth in peak demand, since an adverse trend is observed during recent past”.

The simplest solution to this is to move to daylight saving time, which means setting the clock forward by an hour. This proved to be an effective curb on demand when it was implemented after the power crisis of 1996. It was previously used in Ceylon during WWII to conserve power and also by Pakistan after a power crisis in 2008. It is a simple cost free solution that demands immediate implementation.

The management of the demand for power by bulk consumers is also needed. An overlooked aspect of this is the waste of power in the telecommunications industry. Transmission towers consume a lot of power but operators in Sri Lanka do not have a comprehensive infrastructure sharing regime. Operators regard their networks as a source of competitive advantage and share only limited sites. This has resulted in widespread duplication of infrastructure, unnecessary strain on the grid and unsightly visual pollution. The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRC) needs to impose a proper infrastructure sharing regime. Sharing must cover all infrastructure including SLT’s fibre backbone and the TRC should incentivise the decommissioning of redundant sites. Moving on to longer term solutions should private power have a role to play?

In Sri Lanka IPPs have been controversial but the solution is not be to ignore the private sector but instead to move to electricity auctions to procure power. Auctions increase the competition and transparency of electricity procurement and are now quite widely used. Examples include the UK, New Zealand, Australia and Singapore. Open, transparent competition promotes efficiency and reduces costs to consumers. Singapore moved from state monopoly in 1995 to competitive market in stages over a period of years, yielding tangible benefits to consumers. Although the price of oil, the major cost in electricity generation, increased by 152% between 2001 and 2008, Singapore’s electricity tariff rose only 14% during that period. This was possible largely due to efficiency gains in generation, such as utilising more cost-efficient technology.

Competitive pricing encouraged firms to invest, for example in more efficient gas fired combined cycle turbines and retro-fitting existing plants. The share of electricity generated in Singapore by natural gas increased from 19% in 2000 to 79% in 2010 and overall power generation efficiency increased from 38% to 44%. Consequently, carbon dioxide emissions per unit of electricity generated declined by 30% between 2000 and 2007.

The tangible benefits from liberalising the electricity market make a compelling case to move in that direction although the process is by no means a simple or easy. Even in Singapore the major reforms were introduced gradually over a period of a decade, but this should be the vision for Sri Lanka’s power sector.

The Pathfinder Foundation published a paper in 2007 examining in some detail how Sri Lanka could move to a competitive electricity market. The conceptual model for an electricity market, in very simple terms is to have the generation, transmission and distribution split into independent units with competition between them.

It is essential to have several entities carrying out generation (IPPs and entities carved out from existing CEB generation assets). These will compete in a daily computerised auction to sell power to the transmission entity, which should have no links to the generating entities. The auction is usually held a few says before the actual despatch of power is needed. The generating units compete to supply power for fixed time slots in the day, usually for each hour or half hour and the system automatically awards the time slots to each generating unit based on the lowest cost. The transmission entity in turn sells the power to distribution units, which will be monopolies in their respective areas of operation. When distribution utilities operate in similar operational areas, the regulator can easily set up realistic performance targets by comparing their performances. Similarly since the transmission will be carried out by a separate entity the losses in transmission are easily monitored and the incentive is created to minimise leakage.

If practical advice were needed the Government of Singapore has always been willing to share its expertise.

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Ravi Ratnasabapathy trained as a management accountant and has broad industry experience in finance. He is interested in economic policy and governance issues.