HCCI For Coal Power Generation To Meet Energy Crisis

President Hyderabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (HCCI) Adeel Siddiqui on Saturday stressed the need for coal-based power generation to overcome energy crisis

HYDERABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 2nd Jul, 2022 ) :President Hyderabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (HCCI) Adeel Siddiqui on Saturday stressed the need for coal-based power generation to overcome energy crisis.

In a statement issued here, he urged that initiatives like the Thar Coal Project should be launched to lessen reliance on Regasified Liquefied Natural Gas (RLNG) and oil-based power generation to rid the country of economic woes.

There would be less power generation in coming months, he said, adding that fuel import was overburdening consumers as the electricity tariff was constantly being increased to meet IMF conditionality.

The government, he said, needed $ 40bn in the next 10 months to address the economic crisis. Pakistan's liquidity crunch was driven by increasing prices of crude oil, adding that since the government was facing financial constraints it was useless to rely on RLNG's import.

Pakistan was facing depleting gas reserves, thus relying on RLNG.

"It is a wrong policy", he said, adding that RLNG import to meet gas shortage was putting the country in a difficult situation. Its import undermined financial stability and energy conservation efforts, he said.

Imported LNG was six times more costly than from domestic resource. It remained unreliable and its supplies faced default on at least 10 cargoes since 2021 to date that eventually led to rise in fuel and electricity shortages, he observed.

Pakistan, he said, would not be able to compete with the economies of Europe and Northeastern Asian countries. The country had imported 7.4 m tonnes of LNG and the government anticipated that LNG demand would increase in the next decade, he added.

In view of the above facts, he said that the government should focus on coal based power generation as well as gas exploration in order to overcome the energy and gas crisis in the country.