ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has said monitoring system for power supply has been installed at the Prime Minister’s House and asked the authorities concerned to take on the issue of loadshedding and unscheduled loadshedding shouldn’t be permitted.
“No laxity would be permitted in the business of ensuring power supply to the people,” he said chairing the third consecutive meeting of Cabinet Committee on Energy (CCE) in less than a month on Monday. He said the government will not tolerate any trouble caused to the masses.
The meeting took place at the Prime Minister’s House and Secretary Water & Power Yousaf Nasim Khokhar briefed the committee on the current load management plan, implementation status of planned and ongoing energy projects and enhancement of transmission system.
Nawaz directed for minimum loadshedding during Ramazan and immediate resolution of tariff issues. He reviewed the overall demand and supply situation of the power. Yousaf Nasim Khokhar informed the meeting that during the present government, a total of 9,625 MW in 132 KV and 2,004 MW in 11 KV systems has been installed. He said capacity enhancement has been achieved in the transmission system, which is unprecedented and is essential keeping in view new power generation, which is scheduled to come into the national grid and allocated to DISCOs in the next nine months.
Former Secretary Power Younis Dhaga, who is currently federal secretary for commerce, also attended the meeting. He served the Ministry of Water and Power for about three years and was transferred last month.
Wapda Chairman Lt Gen (retd) Muzamal Hussain briefed the meeting on progress of hydel power projects including Dasu, Diamer Bhasha and Mohmand Dam. Prime Minister Nawaz asked the Ministry of Water & Power to immediately resolve ‘upfront tariff’ issues with the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) for different sources including LNG, solar, coal, furnace oil, diesel and gas.
The prime minister directed that line departments should work out immediate solutions for administrative and legal issues faced in implementation of energy projects on priority. The National Transmission and Distribution Company (NTDC) was directed to pick up pace of work on HVDC transmission lines and other smaller transmission projects.
Nawaz directed to carry out comparative study on efficiency of various power sources, for presentation in the next CCE meeting. He said the government was working on multiple options of power generation so that consumers were provided with uninterrupted power supply.
For this purpose, the government has focused on adding base load thermal power projects which shall ensure availability of power all through the year even during lean periods of hydro power generation in years to come.
The meeting was attended by Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif, Minister for Petroleum & Natural Resources Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Minister for Planning Ahsan Iqbal, Minister for Water & Power Khawaja Muhammad Asif, State Minister for Information & Broadcasting Marryum Aurangzeb, Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) for Foreign Affairs Syed Tariq Fatemi, Secretary to the Prime Minister (SPM) Fawad Hasan Fawad, Federal Secretary Cabinet Nadim Assef Hasan, Federal Secretary for Petroleum Raja Jalal Sikandar and senior officials.
