NTDC set to dispatch 10,000MW next year

LAHORE: Dr Fiaz Ahmad Chaudhry, managing director, National Transmission and Despatch Company (NTDC), assumed the charge of the institution at a time when speedy commissioning of transmission projects is essential to benefit from the 10,000MW planned power projects.

Q. What do you say about scepticism regarding NTDC’s ability to commission new transmission lines in a timely fashion?

A. The sceptics are not up to date on our progress. We are not far off the target. The completion of all transmission lines is not an option but a compulsion for the company. Yes the job is daunting, but we have to ensure that all the 50 power projects, under various stages of completion, get connected with the national grid.

Some of these projects are located over 1,000 kilometres from the beneficiary regions. Failure to connect any of these power projects with transmission lines will be a huge national loss. As soon as these power projects start producing electricity, the government is bound to buy power or pay capacity charges if power cannot be transmitted.

We have commissioned the six kilometre 500KV transmission line for 1,320MW Sahiwal Coal Plant, and the electricity will be transmitted to the national grid as soon as this project goes online. Similarly, six kilometres 500KV transmission line connecting 1,200MW Bhikki Power Plant will be ready next week. The 65 kilometres 220KV Vehari-Chistian transmission line was completed on October 5; the 500KV Shikarpur transmission line became operational on May 16; and the 56 kilometres Haveli Bahadur Shah Transmission line of 500KV was commissioned on May 16.

Eighty three percent works on the Neelum-Jhelum transmission line are completed and it will be ready by April 2017; Och-Sibi transmission line is scheduled to be operational in March 2017. Dera Murad Jamali transmission line will be ready next month. The 56 meter long 500KV Haveli Bhadur Shah line is scheduled to complete in April 2017, 500KV Rahim Yar Khan in June 17, and 40km long Ballocki transmission line will be complete in March 2017.

Q. What are the challenges in this regard?

A. Mitiari-Rahim Yar Khan transmission line being laid on a 900km route is a challenge, but it is surmountable. The issues with the Chinese contractor have been settled, and the contractor will begin work once the tariff is settled. The contractor has completed homework and has already negotiated with 607 local contractors for laying 125-150km transmission line each. This job can be completed in six months.

This line is important because it will transmit power from all the coal-run power plants using Thar coal as fuel.

The greatest challenge we face is our limited capacity. In 69 years, NTDC connected 75 power plants through transmission lines. From 2014-2017 it has been tasked to connect 50 new plants with the grid. The capacity of the current transmission system is to tolerate a load of up to 1,740MW. In 2017-18 we will have to upgrade the system to tolerate additional 8,000MW.

Our human resource has depleted. As transmission was not a priority for the previous government, many professionals left the country to seek better fortunes in the developed economies and Middle East.

Barring a few, many of the leftover human resource is either lethargic or incompetent. We need high repute professionals as we have capacity constraints. We are pursuing talented and experienced engineers of global repute employed overseas. We received encouraging response from some, who think it is a national duty to contribute for the national cause.

Q. What measures have you taken to remove constraints in the current system?

A. We are working round the clock not only on new transmission lines, but also on aggressively testing the capacity of the existing systems. We have tested the tolerance of the system by separately running each distribution company without load shedding at peak hours.

These tests exposed the flaws and troubled regions in each power distribution company.  

We are importing high capacity quality transformers to replace the lower capacity units for ensuring seamless supplies. The low capacity transformers can be used elsewhere, where the load is small. The discos have also been informed of the flaws in their system and advised to upgrade.