ISLAMABAD, Jan 17: The Indus River System Authority (Irsa) has directed Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) to stop water release from Mangla Dam forthwith for an indefinite period, Dawn learnt on authority.

The closure of the dam comes on the request of the Punjab Irrigation Department that had already closed all canals and irrigation channels for annual cleaning and maintenance, Irsa sources said.

This is for the first time that there would be zero power generation as well as water outflow from the country’s second largest water reservoir after the Tarbela Dam since Mangla Dam started operating in 1967.

The dam is likely to remain closed beyond the first week of February. Punjab has already postponed the opening of Tarimu and Sidhnai headworks till Feb 2 and 3 respectively because of some emergency maintenance works, these sources said.

Originally, the Punjab was to open two headworks on Jan 17 and 18, respectively, but had to reschedule it because of some emergency factors, these sources said.

With river inflows at 5,100 cusecs on Friday, water level at Mangla dam was recorded at 1086.85 feet, slightly over 46 feet more than its 1040 feet dead-level. Mangla’s maximum storage level is 1212 feet.

The sources said that only one unit of the Mangla power house was in operation till Friday. Its four units have the generation capacity of around 1,000 MW.

Wapda has to implement the Irsa directive about Mangla outflows on Saturday, a very difficult option because it would cost the organization perhaps over Rs1 billion in a fortnight.

Its normal fuel oil bill is slightly over Rs2 billion per month which sometimes could touch Rs3 billion in winter due to shortage of hydro power generation and Wapda had to rely more on costly thermal power to meet country’s energy requirements.

Mangla dam is the country’s cheapest source of power generation at around 13 paisa per unit as against average Rs3 per unit thermal power production cost. Wapda’s overall average sale price is more than Rs3.50 per unit.

Wapda’s thermal power generation share had already touched 80 per cent level due to the shortage of water in rivers and low storage in reservoirs, Wapda Chairman Zulfiqar Ali Khan said two days ago.

The revised plan of the Rs59 billion raising of the Mangla dam project was cleared by the central development working party (CDWP) early this month to raise the height of the dam by around 30 feet.

President General Pervez Musharraf had performed the ground-breaking ceremony of the dam in September last.