LAHORE, March 24: Wapda chairman Tariq Hamid has said land acquisition for construction of the Kalabagh dam has started.
Speaking at a reception hosted by the Qaumi Tajar Ittehad at its office here on Saturday, he said the Diamer-Bhasha dam would be completed in 2016 and the Kalabagh dam could be completed in seven years if the government gave the go-ahead for its construction today.
He said electricity tariff could be kept under control only through hydel power generation because thermal power generation had become costly. Alternative energy sources were also needed to be exploited, he said.
Mr Hamid said the government had allowed only 10 per cent increase in power tariff after October 2004. Furnace oil prices had risen from Rs10,000 to Rs22,000 per ton and gas tariff had increased by 50 per cent during that period, he said.
He said the decision to charge higher tariff for higher power consumption was taken by the government, not Wapda.
The lowest power rate for 2.4 million domestic consumers was still Rs1.04 per unit and commercial rate was Rs7.5 per unit.
He said Wapda was making arrangements for meeting the increasing power demand. Power consumption in Lahore, Kasur and Sheikhupura ranged between 2,050 and 2,100 megawatts and was expected to rise by 200mw this year. He said Wapda had started generating 150mw electricity from a rented powerhouse on the Sheikhupura Road and another rented unit would start generating 136mw power from April.He said Wapda was not only increasing power generation for meeting the increasing demand but was also making efforts to control consumption.
He said the authority had talked to the industry to stagger holidays which could help reduce consumption by 100mw.
Consumption could be cut by another 50 megawatts if farmers operated their tubewells only between 10pm and 6am on concession of 25 per cent to avail 25 per cent in tariff. Another 105mw electricity could be saved by installing streetlights on alternate poles.
He said Wapda had also started replacing transmission and distribution transformers for reducing line-losses. It had replaced 20 transmission transformers and the remaining 30 would be replaced by June. Replacement of distribution transformers would be started soon.
Ansar Zahoor Butt, Irfan Iqbal and other representatives of the Qaumi Tajar Ittehad complained about excessive billing, corruption in grant of commercial and industrial connections and frequent power breakdowns.
