Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) has written to the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) to enter into an agreement for the purchase and sale of 40 megawatts of electricity produced in Nepal.

BPDB has sent a letter on Monday for the electricity sale agreement, informing that the bid submitted by the authority for the sale of 40 MW electricity for 6 months of rainy season has been accepted by the relevant authorities.

According to the provisions of the law, on 16 December 2080, BPDB called for a tender for the purchase of 40 megawatts of electricity produced in Nepal for a period of five years in accordance with the tripartite agreement between the entities of Bangladesh, India and Nepal. The NEA had submitted the tender document with the price of electricity to be sold in the prescribed format for the sale of electricity.

BPDB informed the NEA of its intention to accept the bid after evaluating the submitted bid documents and informing them that they have been accepted by the relevant agencies.

The NEA shall give a written notice of acceptance of the bid to BPDB within 7 working days. After that, BPDB will provide the draft power sale agreement to the authority.

Agreement should be made within 28 days of receiving the draft. There will be a tripartite agreement between the NEA, NTPC Electricity Trading Corporation (NVVN), India and BPDB.

Kulman Ghising, Managing Director of the NEA, said that after completing all the remaining processes, the work has been started to export electricity to Bangladesh from this rainy season. ‘As the three bodies have agreed on the draft of the tripartite electricity sale agreement, the agreement will be made soon, then we will send the list of projects to the Central Electricity Authority of India for Bangladesh electricity export approval. We will send it for approval.'

The NEA has prepared to export the electricity produced by the 25 MW Trishuli and 22 MW Chilime hydropower project, which was built with Indian subsidy. Both these projects have received approval for electricity export in India.

The authority will sell 40 megawatts of electricity to Bangladesh for 6 months of the rainy season, i.e. from 15 June to 15 November every year for five years. The Authority will get a fee of 6.40 US cents per unit from the sale of electricity to Bangladesh.

The NEA will get the price of electricity exported to Bangladesh through the first international Dhalkebar-Muzaffarpur 400 kV transmission line between Nepal and India at the Muzaffarpur point in India.

In other words, the electricity meter exported to Bangladesh will remain in Muzaffarpur. The authority will bear the technical leakage of the transmission line from Dhalkebar to Muzaffarpur. Electricity will reach Bangladesh through Bahrampur (India)-Vermara (Bangladesh) 400 kV transmission line from Muzaffarpur through India's transmission line.

Kulman Ghisingh, NEA MD, said that Bangladesh will bear all the taxes and fees including transmission line fees, leakages, trading margin taken by NVVN after the Muzaffarpur point. Ghising said that the per unit rate of electricity will be around 7.6 cents when it reaches the border of Bangladesh.

"We will get 6.40 cents at Muzaffarpur point, there is no currency risk as we will be paid in dollars, the rate we got is reasonable for the sale of electricity in the rainy season", he said, "The electricity trade that is going to be done symbolically in the first phase with Bangladesh at the government-government level will, on the one hand, in the future During the day, it will support and facilitate large-scale trade in the region, on the other hand, it will open many other avenues for electricity trade.