According to an official report, the difference between firm supply and peak demand is estimated at 5,529 MW by the year 2009-10 when firm electricity supply will stand at 15,055 MW against peak demand of 20,584 MW.It says that no power generation project will commission during this fiscal year and the total installed capacity of electricity generation will remain 19,478 MW to meet 15,082 MW firm supply and 14,642 MW peak demands. The report said that Malakand-III (81MW), Pehur (18MW) and combined cycle power plant at
Faisalabad (450MW) were planned to be commissioned during the year 2007. Mangla Dam raising project were also to add 150 MW capacities to the national grid by June 2007. Besides this, Khan Khwar (72MW), Allai Khwar (121MW), Duber Khwar (130MW) and Kayal Khwar (130MW) were expected to be completed in 2008 along with Golan Gol (106MW) and Jinnah (96MW). Moreover, Matiltan (84MW), New Bong Escape (79MW) and Rajdhani (132MW) were expected by 2009 while Taunsa (120MW) is likely to be completed by 2010.
The report explained that WAPDA has also planned to install a high efficiency combined cycle power plant at Baloki (450MW), which is expected to be completed by 2010. In addition to these, power plant 1 & 2 of 300 MW each at Thar Coal with the assistance of China are also planned for commissioning in 2009. Moreover, efforts are also under way with China National Nuclear Corporation for the construction of a third nuclear power plant with a gross capacity of 325 MW at Chashma.
About the system augmentation to bring down line losses, WAPDA would spend Rs 3.5 billion on augmentation of distribution lines this fiscal while another Rs 5 billion will be consumed on transmission lines. WAPDA has been negotiating an Rs 9 billion loan with a consortium of local banks to upgrade and augment the power transmission system. Five new transmission lines of 220-KV would be installed that would ensure smooth supply to the consumers.
Energy Conservation Measures:
Energy conservation or efficient use of electricity is what is needed at this crucial time. The three stakeholders are industrial sector, transport sector and domestic/household sector. Each sector needs to be dealt separately to high light the efficiency conserving energy.
The Industrial sector is consuming the largest amount of energy in the country. It consumes around 45 per cent of the total commercial energy. Most of them are concentrated in a few industrial areas close to or within large cities such as Karachi, Lahore and other comparatively smaller cities. Industrial units are not energy efficient and management practices need improvement to make efficient use of electricity.
The transport sector is the second largest consumer of energy. According to an ENERCON study, this sector consumes 28 percent of total national consumption of energy. This could be reduced by 10 percent if car owners alone were to economize on consumption of fuel and kept their car engines fully tuned up.
The third largest consumer of electricity is domestic/household sector that consumes around 21 percent of electricity produced in the country. According to a study, this sector could be efficient by 30 percent by avoiding wasteful habits of consuming energy such as keeping markets fully lit etc. A positive development that has so far taken place in this sector is gradual shifting over to use of energy savers. Similarly, energy could be saved by minimum use of air conditioners. The entire household should be well aware of energy consumption.
Measures by the Government:
The outgoing government had belatedly addressed the power crisis by hyping up the construction of mega hydroelectric dams including politically controversial Kalabagh dam without going into details about their feasibility and sources of investment. The new government has a real big challenge of addressing the energy crisis at hand. Its first priority should be to implement immediate measures that might bring some relief to the public.
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