Govt Committed To Ending Power Load-shedding By 2018: Abid Sher Ali

Govt committed to ending power load-shedding by 2018: Abid Sher Ali

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 10th Nov, 2016 ) : Minister of State for Water and Power Chaudhary Abid Sher Ali has said the government was utilizing all its resources for power generation in order to eliminate curse of load-shedding by 2018.

The minister expressed these views in a briefing at Private Power and Infrastructure board (PPIB), said a press release issued here Thursday. Managing Director PPIB, Shah Jahan Mirza explained that currently power from private sector in Pakistan constitutes around 47 per cent of the total installed capacity and due to efforts by PPIB, 31 IPPs of 9048 MW were currently supplying power to the National Grid.

He briefed on the projects presently being processed by PPIB and their various stages of development. He briefed that currently PPIB was processing 29 projects with the capacity of 17550 MW which would be coming online during 2017-2024.

As per commitment of the present government, projects were now being processed on cheaper fuels like Hydro, Coal and RLNG. From portfolio of PPIB projects, 16 Hydel projects of 6400 MW were under various stages of processing.

Similarly nine projects of 7400 MW based on coal and 3750 MW projects based on gas/RLNG were in the PPIB portfolio of projects. It was briefed that PPIB was expediting the projects and facilitating the projects sponsors to bring their projects on line by 2018.

It was expected that the national grid would have around 7500 MW from the private sector by 2018. The government had announced Transmission Line Policy in 2015 under which PPIB had been given responsibility to process transmission line projects in IPP mode.

Under this policy, PPIB had started process of 660kV HVDC Transmission Line from Matiari to Lahore in IPP mode which would facilitate transmission of power from southern part of the country to the north.

Abid Shwer Ali appreciated the work of PPIB and its mode of working. He felicitated PPIB for its contribution made so far in augmenting the power sector of Pakistan, as well as the present efforts to facilitate in getting rid of the menace of forced power cuts.