Karnataka's draft would charge homes 50% extra for power above their limit
The national rule it borrows from, written in 2023, says to bill the peak a smart meter records and sets no surcharge.
Karnataka's electricity regulator wants homes to pay a premium for their busiest half hour, wherever the meter records it, as every smart meter does. When a home draws more than its sanctioned load, the most power its connection is approved to take at once, the excess would be billed at one and a half times the usual rate. Shops, offices and factories would pay twice.
Both rates are in a draft rulebook the regulator published in August and is now taking to public hearings. The premium falls on the fixed charge, the monthly amount set by the size of a connection. The price of each unit used stays the same.
The national rule sets no premium
In June 2023 the Ministry of Power amended the national rules on consumers' rights. When a smart meter records demand above the sanctioned load, the bill "shall be calculated based on the actual recorded maximum demand", and the customer is to be told by text message.
Karnataka's draft keeps the text message and adds the multipliers: two times the tariff for every category except homes, and one and a half times for homes. It also says that going over the limit "shall not be treated as unauthorised use of supply", which spares the customer a penalty assessment.
Businesses on demand-based tariffs already pay double. Karnataka's tariff order of March 2025 charges "two times the normal rate" on demand above the contract, for high-voltage connections and for shops and factories that chose demand-based billing. The same order sets no premium for homes.
For a home with a 5 kW sanctioned load whose meter records 7 kW (our arithmetic, at this year's fixed charge of Rs 150 a kW): billed on the actual peak at the normal rate, the month's fixed charge is Rs 1,050. Under the draft it is Rs 1,200, because each of the 2 extra kW costs Rs 225.
Three busy months, and the connection grows
The draft also carries over the national rule's reset. If recorded demand passes the limit at least three times in a financial year, the lowest of those peaks becomes the new sanctioned load from the next April, and fixed charges follow it.
For the same home, three peaks with the lowest at 6 kW would make it a 6 kW connection. At next year's rate of Rs 160 a kW, its fixed charge rises by Rs 160 every month, including months when it draws far less.
A half hour a battery could cover
The draft defines a peak as the highest average load over any 30 minutes in the billing period. A surge of a few seconds when a motor starts barely moves that average. An air conditioner, a geyser and an induction stove running together for half an hour sets the month's figure.
A battery that supplies the difference for that half hour keeps the peak off the meter. For the 7 kW home, that means 2 kW for 30 minutes, or 1 kWh, by our arithmetic. Rooftop solar lowers the units a home buys, but a peak after sunset gets no help from the panels.
The draft never mentions batteries. The word "battery" appears nowhere in its 122 pages, and the only "storage" is a device that holds meter data. Electric-vehicle charging gets two sections of its own.
Who should decide how big a home's connection is: the household that applied for it, or a meter that caught three busy evenings? Under the draft, the meter decides.
What happens next
Written objections have closed. Six public hearings run until 22 October, all in northern Karnataka, and none is listed yet for Bengaluru. Entry 110 has the towns and dates.
In Karnataka's draft, a home's busiest half hour carries a 50% premium, and the battery that could flatten it is never mentioned.
What we could not confirm
- Does the 2023 national rule allow a state to charge more than the normal rate on a smart meter's recorded excess?
- Would a home battery need the power company's approval, or count towards its connected load, under the draft?
The document
Draft Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (Electricity Supply Regulations), 2026: section 2.66 (maximum demand) and sections 26.6 and 26.7 (billing above the sanctioned load). Published in the Official Gazette of Karnataka on 14 August 2026 by the Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission, Bengaluru.
- Draft regulations, 122 pages: https://kerc.karnataka.gov.in/uploads/12121787573621.pdf
- Electricity (Rights of Consumers) Amendment Rules, 2023, G.S.R. 437(E), Ministry of Power, 14 June 2023, rule 5(5B). Copy of the Gazette notification: https://jmkresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Electricity-Rights-of-Consumers-Amendment-Rules-2023-1.pdf
- Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission, Combined Tariff Order 2025, 27 March 2025, Annexure 9: tariff schedules LT-1 and LT-3(a), and the billing conditions for LT and HT installations. Copy at OpenCity: https://data.opencity.in/dataset/b814028a-ee24-477a-b9bd-f4a6391589fb/resource/9e85e018-34cd-48a3-93c7-0b95ecf804d4/download/3500f8d4-1d26-4ff8-a08f-8c2d8bac9fbd.pdf
- Highlights of the proposed changes: https://kerc.karnataka.gov.in/uploads/34211787573519.pdf
- Public hearing notice, 25 September 2026: https://kerc.karnataka.gov.in/uploads/69541790574131.pdf
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