105km Railway Track To Be Laid From Chhor To Islamkot For Transporting Thar Coal

A 105-kilometer railway line will be constructed from Chhor to Islamkot to transport coal from Thar Coal Field to Port Qasim and up-country, apart from launching coal to gas to urea and liquid projects, and installation of 1320 megawatts power plant in Thar Coal Block-VI under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)-related projects

KARACHI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 21st Feb, 2020 ) :A 105-kilometer railway line will be constructed from Chhor to Islamkot to transport coal from Thar Coal Field to Port Qasim and up-country, apart from launching coal to gas to urea and liquid projects, and installation of 1320 megawatts power plant in Thar Coal Block-VI under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)-related projects.

This was stated in a meeting held between Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah and CPEC Authority (CPECA) Chairman General (retd) Asim Saleem Bajwa here at the CM's House on Friday.

The meeting was attended by Minister for Energy Imtiaz Shaikh, Planning and Development Department Chairman Mohammad Waseem, PSCM Sajid Jamal Abro, Secretary Energy Musadiq Khan.

Gen Bajwa was assisted by Energy Specialist of CPEC Authority Yasir Arfat and Infrastructure Specialist Muzamil Zia.

The CPECA chairman told the chief minister that the Chinese president was expected to visit Pakistan between May and June this year.

The chief minister said at CPEC related forums, three projects of Sindh, including Karachi Circular Railway, China Special Economic Zone Dhabeji and Keti Bandar, had already been approved. Only their financial mechanism was yet to be finalized.

Talking about KCR, he said a framework agreement between Pakistan and the Chinese Planning Commission known as NDRC was in process. Similarly, a concessional ggreement between China and Pakistan was being made, he said and added that the Pakistan Railways and the Sindh government had also agreed on handing over the Right of Way at common corridor between ML-1 and KCR.

Gen (retd) Bajwa said the KCR was on top priority of the CPECA. He would pursue the already approved projects and the new projects with the Chinese authority so that work on them could be started at the earliest.

He said the KPT had become one of the most loaded ports, therefore a plan had been worked out to construct an expressway right on the sea upto Malir At this, the chief minister said Keti Bandar was also an important strategic and alternate port.

The CPEC Authority chairman said in order to transport Thar coal to Port Qasim and upcountry a 105 km railway track would be laid from Chhor to Islamkot to provide an access to Islamkot, the coal field area.

The chief minister said the provincial government had earmarked 1530 acres of land for the China Special Economic Zone Dhabeji, a CPEC priority project. Dhabeji, he said, had various advantages such as it had access to the Port Qasim enabling raw material import and finished goods export without incurring major inland transportation costs and saving time.

Murad said Dhabeji Zone had access to Jinnah Terminal which was hardly 35 kilometers via the National Highway enabling safe travel for foreign workers and management personal.

It had also direct access to the National Highway enabling the transportation of goods to upcountry and Central Asian nations utilizing the National Trade Corridor, he added.

He said the project had been approved by the Executive Committee of National Economic Council (ECNEC) and it had also committed to provide services such as electricity and gas.

He said the K-Electric would provide 250 MW electricity at the doorsteps of Dhabeji Zone with an estimated cost of Rs 4 billion. The Planning Commission had also approved the PC-I prepared by Sindh Investment Department.

He added that 10 million gallons per day (MGD) water and 13.5 million cubic feet per day (MMCFD) gas would be also provided to the zone.

The chief minister said the Keti Bandar was located about 107 km from the Thatta city and 150 km from Karachi via Gharo which was very promising in terms of future prospects.

"The Keti Bandar Project is an important part of his government's strategy towards developing the energy sector," he said.

He disclosed that a private firm had been engaged to conduct technical and financial feasibility studies of the project in December 2019. The financial feasibility was almost complete and the report would be submitted by the end of current month.

He said the studies were to be made in three phases. The first phase was the technical feasibility for setting up 1320 MW power plant, railway line from Thar to Keti Bandar, power evacuation to the National Grid, construction of a coal jetty and allied infrastructure. The second phase consisted of the bid management and the third was for transaction advices.

The other CPEC- related projects, which came under discussion in the meeting, were two major potential projects based on Thar coal, which were discussed on the 9th JCC meeting held on November 5, 2019.

The first project is coal to Liquid Engineering Plan based on Thar coal at Thar, and the second one is Thar Block-IV for coal gasification for fertilizer production.

It was pointed out in the meeting that the combined designed urea production capacity of urea firms in Pakistan was at 6,447KMT per annum while they were operating at 5700 KMT per annum in 2018. The reason for their low capacity utilization was reduced availability of natural gas.

It was told that the combined natural gas needs for the urea plant was 775 million std. cubic feet (MMCFD) of which 154 or 20 percent was coming from refined liquefied natural gas (RLNG) in 2018.