Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question is from the line of Mohit Kumar from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.

Three questions from my side , so one is on the renewa ble pipeline, we see a lot of bidding happening, but we don't see us participating in this , is there a conscious decision not to participate in any of the renewable biddings which are happening currently or are really reassessed from this position after some time?

No, we are participating, but we are very cautious about the bottomline also. So we thought that the only solar and wind standalone project will not offer the better return. So we look at the hybrid kind of a project will offer the better return , so return expectation is more important for us than simply bidding the projects.

Do you expect to see Hybrid bids will have a lesser competition, is that a fair assessment?

Yes, hybrid project has a lesser competition. That is what our understanding is, yes and it offered better returns also.

My second question is on the given that there is a lack of power capacity and the captive power plants in the sense should be in demand, c an we expect that D GEN to start operating at some point of time at a higher PLF and did the government conducted a bid in this particular for the month of October?

Yes, government has currently offered the new tenders, but finally, because of lower demand, it was not offered to us, but we expect that the DGEN project, in fact, if you look at the su mmer as well as pre-winters a year, we were able to offer the DGEN project, we are able to sell power in the merchant market. Going forward because of the energy situation in the country, we expect demand from merchant power will come during the summer time as well as pre -winter period and expect DGEN project will possibly run during those periods.

And this is my last question is on the set, is it possible to give us the EBITDA breakup for the quarter or for the half year?

So it is given in the result which we have announced. In fact we have started giving the segment wise reporting which has EBITDA also. It is there in the financial result, which we have announced, segm ent wise performance we have given for the distribution , generations, renewables, so you can get from that quarterly numbers as well as half yearly numbers as well as yearly numbers also.

Merchant volumes in this quarter?

So approx. 272 MUs we are able to sell in the merchant market.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Anuj Upadhyay from Invest ec Capital. Please go ahead.

Sir, LNG profitability for this quarter compared to the previous year quarter?

So Anuj, this quarter there was not much of LNG sales, it was more of merchant sale, which has contributed to the profitability. So if you compare the last quarter as well as current quarter, both merchant and LNG put together, we earn above Rs. 130 crores less contribution LNG as well as merchant.

Combined contribution, you are saying Rs. 130 crores for next?

Lower rates compared with the last comparable quarter of last year.

And you mentioned about there could be some delay in the commissioning of 300 MW SECI XII project, any indications of how much delay would it be a quarter or two or something?

SECI was unable to finalize the onward PPA I would say with the cou ple of Discoms. That is why there will be some delay in signing the PPA with us also, so maybe in a quarter or so, they will come back to us what kind of extension they are going to give.

And then the timeline, which you can throw for the 175 MW of project which we are targeting for the merchant market and other 191 C&A project?

Maybe about 15 to 18 month is the duration one can expect.

Sir, are we still sticking to our long-term goal, long term in the sense 3 to 4 years kind of a goal to have 5 GW of renewable capacity in our kitty because as you mentioned in the earlier question that we are strategically looking into bidding this project , so we don't want to lose onto the earnings for the return portfolio by adding more projects to the kitty, so are we still sticking to the 5 GW back for 26?

So Anuj, earlier also when we said we were always saying that it was always subject to we getting the desired returns which we are looking at , so again that caveat remains that 5 GW is the aspiration which we want to but not at the cost of the profitability of the return profile.

Thank you. Next question is from the line of Dhruv Muchhal from HDFC Asset Management. Please go ahead.

Sir, the first question was the electricity demand growth has been very reasonable across your circle, so if you can share some sense and we see that across India also , if you can share some sense on what is driving this, probably we understand some bit could be residential , but some incremental thoughts from you, particularly if I take T&D which is probably largely commercial and industrial area for you, there also demand growth is about 8% this quarter , so just some granular details on what your view is driving this?

The combination of, if you look at the GDP numbers also and industrial demand which is very strong right now, which is what it is driving the demand across all our distribution areas.

So Dhruv, if you look at DD DNH, which is as you rightly said it is more of an industrial area which has showed a growth of 8%. If you look at Agra also which is more of residential or in Ahmedabad which is more of residential they hav e a lso shown a good growth in terms of volumes is concerned. So as far as the demand for the entire electricity is concerned, I think it is coming from all the angles, be it industrial or be it residential or commercial. So country as a whole H1 demand consumption o f electricity was about 9.3%. That is what government has announced the number, so which is reflected in our performance also in our area of operations.

So for your area say particularly areas which are relatively high industrial, if you split that between industrial and say residential, would the growth be similar in between residential and industrial or is there something which is growing more faster and something slower?

No, so I think it would not be right to generalize that. So if I tell you that Bhiwandi is an industrial area, but it has not shown growth because of particular issues with respect to the industry which it has. So as far as generalization is concerned would be very difficult to generalize that, but yes, if I look at my areas then all the areas have shown typical growth, some, maybe couple of percentage higher, some couple of percentage lower, but as far as residential or industrial is concerned, both of them have shown good growth.

Growth within the areas for the segments, it is reasonable both for industrial , residential, it is same across? And sir the second thing was, similar to the renewable bids, transmission bids are also we see that the pace of transmission bid awarding is increasing, sir, how do we think of our participation there because I think earlier we were looking at getting some bid there?

I think, Dhruv we participate in all the biddings which happen for renewable or for transmission. Sometimes we are not successful because we are not willing to go beyond certain point in terms of rates are concerned.

So in your view, still the rates in transmission bidding is not as attractive probably for you, it is not as attractive yet despite the increase in pace for now?

As of now, yes.

Thank you. Next question is from the line of Jiten Rushi from Axis Capital. Please go ahead.

Sir, just on the LNG and the merchant site, two last year we had a Rs. 155 crore of LNG gain, so as you said the decline is Rs. 130 crores this time Rs. 36 crores and Rs. 25 crores was the earnings from the LNG and merchant?

Yes.

And sir, what could be the break u p between this two because in Q1 it was like Rs. 10 crores from LNG gain and Rs. 134 from merchant, so in this Rs. 25 crores?

Major part of it is merchant, very small part from LNG trading.

And what was the rate at which you have sold the merchant power?

Average rate would be around Rs. 10 to Rs. 11 range.

So probably you are expecting this run rate to continue this quarter? Any additional earnings of Rs. 25-Rs. 30 crores wanted to maintain in merchant?

I think it would be very speculative to answer that question whether that will sustain or not, but if you look at merchant prices right now, because winter setting in, expectation is it will slightly go down and then again pick up let us say somewhere at the end of Q4.

And on the parallel licensing, any updates like you were talking about the parallel licensing in Maharashtra and other states, so?

Parallel licensing, we have completed all compliances, whatever compliances is required from the regulator, we have completed all compliances. We are now just waiting to take this forward for that internal process.

So how long the process will take more time from here or what is your view?

And sir, on the pumped hydro storage, obviously last quarter also we highlighted something and you also have stated in the opening remarks that removing what al lotted some land, so can you just throw further light and what is the progress now in the pumped hydro storage during the last folder?

It is a long-term project, so maybe 5-6 years is required to materialize, to see the pumps which operating. The first step is we have to get the MoU approval which we have obtained. Now the second stage is that DPR and then take it forward for the approval.

So basically, sir, the initial perpetrator y work will take another two years before the actual construction or exhibition?

I think so, yes, you are right.

And probably after that the construction will work for like 4-5 years?

3-4 years, I would say.

So in all like 5 to 6 years for commissioning from now?

Yes.

Thank you. Next question is from the line of Amit from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Sir, I wanted to get some sense around the performance in the license and franchise distribution, I mean you have clubbed both the segments in T&D so how should one look at? What would be a good way to understand how franchise is performing?

So we have said in the beginning of the call saying that the both license and franchise distribution performance is better and we have improved the performance by Rs. 66 crores on combined basis. That is what all we can say.

And on the PSP part, I mean, what kind of models are we looking at? Are we looking at a leasing kind of model or we would go for regulated bids or how would it be?

I think as of now it is too early to comment on that. We have kept our options open . Once we get nearer to getting those approvals, we will really see whether we want to go into leasing part or do our RTC project and sell the energy.

Thank you. Next question is from the line of Bharani Vijaykumar from Spark Capital. Please go ahead.

So hybrid project is a high CUF project. In fact you can able to deliver the higher PLF cost I would say so which will ensure that the availability of power is higher, I would say so because of the inherent advantage of high CUF project retails would be higher.

High cost you mean?

No, high CUF I mean. So basically what happens is that in this kind of projects , you will have to really identify the sites which can provide you higher PLF both on wind and solar and then only you can give a high CUF solution to the purchaser which means that you will have to identify those sites and be ready when the tenders come, so that the competition itself would be lower because of which the returns could be higher compared to pure plain vanilla projects or wind or solar.

And does common transmission network and infrastructure, which is required, which will probably come up at much lesser cost per MW, is that also a reason?

That would also be a one factor, but I think major factor would be lesser competition in the bids compared to all those cost saving and evacuation facility will be better utilized in case of hybrid project.

And what I am noticing is that in the recent SECI bids, there is this firm and dispatchable renewable energy kind of bids that are coming up which mandates storage also to be part of the bids, so are we bidding for those kinds of bids?

Our interest is to go and try for the hybrid kind of projects.

And the last question from my side is on the entire gas capacity in the country and especially for us, now recently government has been doing a lot of measures to improve power supply in the country and some of the measures also include reviving the stranded assets, be it coal, maybe even on gas, so are you seeing any long-term action that government is planning to do to revive the entire gas space which will also benefit us?

Our expectation is the power deficit scenario is going to continue for a couple of months, going to come I would say , so we expect that the gas is probably the better place to deliver in those periods in those particular summer period or the winter period.

So what you are telling is the temporary measures that the government has been doing that will continue no long-term measures which will resolve the stranded assets?

At least for some period of time, we are seeing that situation.

Thank you so much. Thank you for attending the Torrent Power Earnings Call. We wish everybody to stay safe and healthy and Happy Diwali to all of you. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. On behalf of Torrent Power Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.