Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The government is utilizing all its resources for power generation to eliminate load shedding by 2018, said State Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali on Thursday.

He said this during a briefing at Private Power and Infrastructure Board (PPIB).

PPIB Managing Director Shah Jehan Mirza said that currently power generation from private sector in Pakistan forms around 47% of the total installed capacity and due to efforts by PPIB, 31 IPPs are currently supplying 9,048 megawatts to the national grid.

The minister was briefed on the projects presently being processed by PPIB and their various stages of development. The meeting was told that currently PPIB is processing 29 projects with the capacity of 17550MW, which will be coming online during 2017-2024. As per commitment of the government, projects are now being processed on cheaper fuels like hydro, coal and RLNG.

As many as 16 hydro projects of 6400MW are under various stages of processing. Similarly nine projects of 7400MW based on coal and 3750MW projects based on gas/RLNG are in the PPIB portfolio of projects.

He was also briefed that PPIB is expediting the projects and facilitating the projects sponsors to bring their projects online by 2018. It is expected that the national grid will have around 7500MW from the private sector by 2018. The government has announced transmission line policy in 2015 under which PPIB has been given responsibility to process transmission line projects in IPP mode. Under this policy, PPIB has started process of 660kV HVDC transmission line from Matiari to Lahore in IPP mode which will facilitate transmission of power from southern part of the country to the north.

The minister praised the PPIB and its mode of working. He felicitated PPIB for its contribution made so far in augmenting the power sector as well as the present efforts to bring an end to forced power cuts.