Solar Park’s power project due to be fully operational by year-end

LAHORE: A provincial minister said on Friday power project at the Quaid-e-Azam Solar Park, considered as one of the world’s largest solar project, would hopefully be fully commissioned by end of the current calendar year.

Sher Ali Khan, minister for Mines and Minerals in Punjab said the government is trying its best to fulfill energy needs of the country. “We have launched the world largest solar power project of one thousand mega watts in Bhawalpur and hopefully it will be commissioned by the end of this year,” Khan said at an international conference on “Energy for Environmental and Economic Sustainability, organized by the Management and Technology in collaboration with Texas Tech University, National Science Foundation of USA and International Association for Hydrogen Energy, USA.

“Out of that project the first 100MW facilities were already commissioned in May, last year,” Khan said. He said all developing countries are suffering of the power crisis and Pakistan is no exception to this situation.  The speakers at the conference noted that dire need for energy is being felt globally all due to emerging technology, industrialization of developing countries, social development and population growth. Both developed and developing countries are now in search of alternative sources of energy.

“By 2030, the world will need to produce more than 21 percent energy,” said Hasan Sohaib Murad, Rector of University of Management and Technology, Lahore.  “All energy resources could stop functioning but the sun as never-ending and great source of energy would always be there to cater human beings’ needs.”

Murad emphasized on adopting maximum sources of energies like hydro, thermal and nuclear power plants was not sufficient rather many other sources such as solar, wind and ocean energy need to be considered.

Speakers said the solution for agricultural revival lies in alternative sources of energy especially in solar energy, which is purely renewable energy source.  It is because Pakistan lies in a hot zone with average solar irradiance of 5.3 kwh/m2/day and because solar energy is available in abundance quantity.

Apart from solar energy, other sources of energy such as ocean energy and wind power were also discussed and researchers presented their models in the conference. Speakers said oceans are a great source of energy as they cover 70 percent of the earth. They said Pakistan has potential to produce ocean thermal energy from offshore areas.

On the other hand, global installed wind power capacity has risen nearly 50 times in the last two decades. It currently fulfils 3.7 percent of global electricity generation and by the year 2050, wind power will contribute up to 18 percent of world’s electricity supply.