NEPRA sets use-of-system charges for open power market: Rs 6.23 to Rs 19.62 a unit for bulk buyers

The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) on Friday 9 October 2026 notified the use-of-system charges that bulk electricity consumers will pay to use the national grid when they buy power from private suppliers, Dawn reported. The decision clears the last big obstacle to the first auction in Pakistan's competitive power market, known as CTBCM (Competitive Trading Bilateral Contract Market).

Who it applies to

The charges apply to bulk power consumers of every distribution company, including K-Electric, that choose to take part in the market. There are a little over 3,000 such consumers in the country, mostly large factories, commercial buildings and agricultural users with a big sanctioned load. Households are not part of it, and the decision does not change residential tariffs.

The rates, in rupees per unit

These charges come on top of the price of the electricity itself, which the buyer agrees with its private supplier. They cover transmission and distribution, a cross-subsidy and a fixed grid charge of Rs 1 per kilowatt of sanctioned load a month, which applies whether or not a consumer joins the auction. NEPRA also set uniform loss factors of 8.04% at 11kV and 1.51% at 132kV.

What happens next

• The Independent System and Market Operator is expected to auction 400MW in the first phase within the next couple of months. The government has set aside 800MW in two phases, to be sold through auctions for five years.
• Bids will have no upper or lower limit and will stay fixed for a year.
• The market's commercial start was declared for 22 January 2026, and the first auction was meant to happen in June. It slipped because these charges had not been set.

NEPRA also ruled that any extra amount needed to cover cost differences between distribution companies will be paid by all consumers, not only by those who switch, so a factory that leaves its distribution company does not pay more grid cost than a similar one that stays.

What it means

For a factory on a B-4 connection, the grid part of the bill falls from about Rs 25 a unit to about Rs 9 if it buys through the auction, leaving room to save if a private supplier offers power cheaper than the distribution company's rate. For everyone else the change is indirect: if large users leave the distribution companies, the fixed costs they used to share have to be recovered somehow, which is why the cross-subsidy element is built into the charge.

To see how per-unit rates add up on an ordinary bill, use our electricity bill calculator or the electricity units calculator.