CHETNA-Power Plants: Unit-Level Inventory with Daily Generation and CO₂ Emissions for India (2018–2025)

The CHETNA–Power Plants dataset provides a unit-level, daily record of electricity generation and associated CO₂ emissions for India’s power sector covering the period 2018–2025. The dataset integrates a harmonized plant–unit inventory with daily power generation records and unit-year-specific emission intensity estimates, enabling consistent tracking of power-sector activity and emissions at high spatial and temporal resolution. The dataset covers all major power-generation technologies in India, including coal-fired thermal power plants, gas–diesel units, hydropower, and nuclear power. For each generating unit, the inventory component provides standardized identifiers, geographic location, administrative attributes, installed and monitored capacity, fuel type, generation technology, commissioning and retirement information, and annual performance indicators. Daily records report gross and net electricity generation, outage indicators, and estimated CO₂ emissions, with explicit flags to distinguish reported values from gap-filled, rescaled, or constrained estimates. CO₂ emissions are estimated by linking harmonized daily electricity generation with unit-year-specific emission intensity, allowing the dataset to capture heterogeneity in operational performance across plants and units rather than relying on fuel-based temporal downscaling or uniform emission factors. Uncertainty bounds are provided for emission intensity and daily emissions to document model-related uncertainty and data-processing effects. All data processing steps, including plant–unit matching, gap filling, and consistency constraints, are transparently documented. The CHETNA–Power Plants dataset is intended to support high-resolution emission monitoring, model evaluation, efficiency benchmarking, and system-level analyses of power-sector emissions and operational dynamics in India. A detailed description of all dataset attributes, variables, units, and flags is provided in the table below. Table 1. Details of the attributes in the plant-unit inventory Variable name Description Unit zone_name Power grid zone of the plant – type Plant type (e.g. THER, THER (GT), DG) – state_id Indian state or union territory – fiscal_year Fiscal year of record – plant_name Standardized plant name – unit Unit identifier within the plant – possible_names Alternative plant names used across datasets – latitude Latitude of the plant degrees longitude Longitude of the plant degrees unit_status Operational status of the unit – start_year Year of commissioning year retired_year Year of retirement (if applicable) year fuel_gem Primary fuel category (GEM classification) – technology Generation technology (e.g. subcritical, combined cycle) – fuel1 Primary fuel type – fuel2 Secondary fuel type (if applicable) – installed_capacity_mw Installed capacity MW monitored_capacity_mw Capacity covered by operational records MW net_generation_mu Annual net electricity generation MU (GWh) fuel_1_consumption_if_coal_only_national_coal Annual fuel-1 consumption (domestic coal) t fuel_1_consumption_only_for_imported_coal Annual fuel-1 consumption (imported coal) t fuel_2_consumption Annual fuel-2 consumption t gcvkcal_kg_fuel_1_if_coal_only_national_coal GCV of domestic coal kcal kg⁻¹ gcvkcal_kg_fuel_1_only_for_imported_coal GCV of imported coal kcal kg⁻¹ gcvkcal_kg_fuel_2 GCV of secondary fuel kcal kg⁻¹ co2ton_fuel_1 CO₂ emissions from fuel 1 t CO₂ co2ton_fuel_2 CO₂ emissions from fuel 2 t CO₂ co2_fuel2_pct Share of fuel-2 in total CO₂ emissions % total_co2ton Total annual CO₂ emissions t CO₂ emission_factor_ton_mwh CO₂ emission intensity t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ auxilary_cons_pct_cal Auxiliary consumption rate % is_emission_factor_predicted Flag indicating predicted emission factor 0/1 daily_agg_gross_GWh Aggregated daily gross generation GWh lower_95_prediction_emission_factor_ton_mwh Lower 95 % bound of the emission factor from the ML model t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ upper_95_prediction_emission_factor_ton_mwh Upper 95 % bound of the emission factor from the ML model t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ emission_factor_ton_mwh_knn_q05 5th percentile bound from scenario analysis with KNN t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ emission_factor_ton_mwh_knn_q25 25th percentile bound from scenario analysis with KNN t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ emission_factor_ton_mwh_knn_q75 75th percentile bound from scenario analysis with KNN t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ emission_factor_ton_mwh_knn_q95 95th percentile bound from scenario analysis with KNN t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ emission_factor_ton_mwh_knn_mean Mean emission factor from scenario analysis with KNN t CO₂ MWh⁻¹ Table 2. Details of the attributes in the daily report dataset Variable name Description Unit state Indian state or union territory – date Calendar date YYYY-MM-DD plant_name Standardized plant name – unit Unit identifier – type Plant type – fiscal_year Fiscal year – actual_GWh Reported gross electricity generation GWh net_generation Net electricity generation GWh outage_flag Indicator of unit outage 0/1 emissions_tons Estimated daily CO₂ emissions t CO₂ prediction_flag Flag indicating predicted daily emissions P - gap filled S - rescaled C - constrained with daily sum emissions_tons_lower_95 Lower 95 % bound of daily CO₂ emissions t CO₂ emissions_tons_upper_95 Upper 95 % bound of daily CO₂ emissions t CO₂ emissions_tons_knn_q05 5th percentile (KNN) t CO₂ emissions_tons_knn_q95 95th percentile (KNN) t CO₂