CM looks into proposals for providing cheap electricity to low-income families

Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah held a meeting on Monday to discuss three proposals for solarising off-grid and on-grid low-income families in the province.

He said that the ever-increasing electricity bills had created unrest among the people because of their inability to afford them. It had become a responsibility of the government to steer the people out of this crisis, he added.

The CM said the energy sector fell under the jurisdiction of the federal government, and it could set the power tariff, however, the provincial government could assist the poor by offering them solar panels or a minimum of 100 power units for free on the directions of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari.

Sindh Energy Minister Syed Nasir Shah, Agriculture Minister Mohammad Bux Khan Mahar, Chief Secretary Asif Hyder Shah and Energy Secretary Musadiq Khan attended the meeting.

Shah briefed the CM on the Benazir Solar Programme and said that they had conducted a survey of low-income families using 100 units per month, and found out that there were 1,976,500 such families, of which 1,054,000 were K-Electric users, 566,427 were users of the Hyderabad Electric Supply Company and 356,073 were users of the Sukkur Electric Power Company.

The meeting was told that there were 2.6 million off-grid households in the province. To this, the CM responded that 500,000 off-grid households should be provided with solar home systems (SHS), which would consist of 100-watt solar panels capable of powering three LED bulbs, a 35-watt fan, a six-hour battery backup, and mobile charging ports.

To a question, Nasir told the CM that each SHS would cost Rs55,000 if they were purchased in a bulk. Another proposal submitted by the energy minister was for micro-grids. Nasir said six micro-grids, each one of 75 kilowatts, could be established at the divisional level to cover a cluster of 100 households.

Those grids would provide 100-kilowatt units per month. He said that each grid would cost around Rs30 million. Murad directed the energy minister to conduct a feasibility study of the grid stations. The CM was informed that around 300 acres of land were required for a grid station in Sukkur, 230 acres in Hyderabad, and 270 acres in Karachi.

The third proposal was about the establishment of three solar parks each one with a cumulative capacity of 350 megawatts. These solar parks could be established under the public-private partnership mode, said the energy minister.