ISLAMABAD: The Businessmen Panel of the FPCCI on Saturday said that Thar coal was cheapest option for power generation in the energy supply chain. Commercial production of electricity from Thar coal will boost the share of coal in the energy mix from the current less than one percent to 24 percent within three years, it said. “Increased share of the local coal in the energy mix will save billions of dollars in the oil import bill while the power production will jump to fifteen gigawatts within a decade burying energy crisis forever,” said Naseemur Rehman, Central Leader of BMP. He said that Chinese investment worth billions of dollars in the project had settled misgivings about the project and now foreign investors were taking interest in it while local industrial groups were also demanding cheap coal for their own power generation. Naseemur Rehman said that Thar contained around 175 billion tonnes of coal enough to revolutionise the country’s economy. “These deposits were not used for decades, but now the situation has changed, which will lead to economic prosperity of the country,” he said. “The area holds more energy than the combined energy of Saudi Arabia and Iran which can change the fate of the country,” he noted. He said that Thar was home to 25 million people; it is rich in resources, but one of the most underdeveloped areas in the country where many suffered from malnutrition and other problems. “The government and private sector should also pay attention to the development of the social sector otherwise all efforts aimed at economic development could fail,” he said. Published in Daily Times, December 17th 2017.