Energy Central-News Article

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Power Division Engineer Khurram Dastgir on Tuesday said that total power generation from local Thar coal stood at 2640 megawatts (MW) with formal commissioning of 1320 MW Shanghai Electric Thar Coal Project under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Addressing a press conference here, the minister said that the project which faced inordinate delay due to criminal negligence of past Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government finally has not only been completed in a short time but also started power supplying to the system. Another 330 MW ThalNova Thar coal project has already been synchronized in mid of this month, he added. He said in short, the incumbent government under the leadership of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif added a total of 1980 MW cheap electricity to the system from indigenous Thar coal resources in just 10 months. The Thar coal would not only help reduce power load-shedding in summer season but also help in power tariff reduction, he added. The minister said there were 175 billion tons of coal reserves at Thar which was sufficient to generate 100,000 MW of electricity. Power generation from Thar coal has buried all doubts that electricity could not be generated from local coal which was a good omen for the entire country, he said. He thanked the entire leadership including Chief Minister Sindh Syed Murad Ali Shah, and Sindh’s Energy Minister Imtiaz Sheikh for their full cooperation to achieve this milestone. Khurram said another project, Bolan-Gwadar Transmission Line has also been completed which would help import 100 MW electricity from Iran to Gwadar. The PM would shortly inaugurate the project, he added. He said transmission of electricity to Gwadar was a big issue but now the project would help address it and the transmission line would start work in mid of March. Regarding the 6,000 MW PM’s solar energy project, he said the request for proposals to set up the first 600 MW solar project at Muzzaffargarh has already been opened and open bidding for the project would be held on April 17. These local indigenous resources power projects would not only help address energy issues but also help in reduction of power tariff in the country, he said. Replying to a question, the minister said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has some reservations over circular debt and wanted some guarantee on it during the next fiscal year. However, he said that no change was being made to basic power tariff fixed during last summer. To another question, the minister said that no power load-shedding was carried out for industrial consumers during the winter. He said over 150,000 industrial consumers were being shifted on Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) System by June. It would help round-the-clock monitoring of the meters, he added.