With the country facing a massive electricity shortage, government asked the states on Tuesday to pull out all stops to setting up captive power plants -- surplus from which could be diverted for public consumption.

"We must unshackle generation, transmission and distribution systems. We cannot shut up this source of energy when we have an acute shortage in the country," Power Secretary Anil Razdan said at a conference on 'Overcoming Power Shortages' organised jointly by Power Grid and Independent Power Producers Association of India.

He said all the rules, regulation and extra charges like cross subsidies should be removed so that surplus power from captive power plants could be supplied to the consumers.

"Beyond regulations concerning safety and grid security all other regulations and extra charges should be removed so that surplus power can be harnessed. We have no moral justification for charging the power coming in when those who were supposed to supply power have failed to do so. Every megawatt counts," Razdan said.

At present, the total installed capacity of captive power plants -- those set up by industries to meet their electricity requirements -- is about 19,000 MW. Of the 72 billion units generated by captive power plants during 2004-05, around 4.2 billion units had been fed into the grid.

Further, a capacity addition of around 12,000 MW is expected during the 11th five-year plan period, of which around 20 per cent is expected to be surplus and available to be fed into the grid.

Razdan said various state governments should work toward removing extra charges and making the state load dispatch centres more independent and autonomous.