Utility Scale DSM Opportunities and Business Models in India

The Ministry of Power, Government of India, defines Demand Side Management (DSM) as "actions of a Distribution Licensee (Utility), beyond the customer's meter, with the objective of altering the end-use of electricity - whether it is to increase demand, decrease it, shift it between high and low peak periods, or manage it when there are intermittent load demands - in the overall interest of reducing the costs of electricity supply'. Another definition of DSM, widely accepted by Indian industry, is that "DSM refers to cooperative activities between the utility and its customers (sometimes with the assistance of third parties such as energy servicescompanies and various trade allies) to implement options for increasing the efficiency of energy utilization, with resulting benefits to the customer, utility, and society as whole'. Often the terms energy efficiency and DSM are used interchangeably. It is important to understand that DSM (in this report) explicitly refers to all those activities that involve deliberate intervention by the Electric Utility in the marketplace so as to alter the consumer's load shape. Because end use energy efficiency solutions can also alter consumers' load shape, all references to DSM in this report includes potential energy efficiency solutions that can be effectively delivered with some form of utility intervention. In fact, the later sections of the report that discuss Utility DSM potential in India categorize DSM opportunities into three principal groups, one of which is energy efficiency