TENSION is crackling between Nepra and the Ministry of Water and Power. The regulator has refused to grant the ministry’s requests for a higher tariff on some occasions and called into question its investment plan for transmission and distribution system upgrades. It has doubted its promise to eliminate load-shedding by 2018 and demanded greater reductions in the power tariff in light of the falling oil prices which the ministry has refused to notify. More recently, it has asked why power dispatch from inefficient plants continues while more efficient plants are shut down. The latest salvo was fired in an open hearing when the Nepra chief once again questioned the merit order list of power plants to be kept running, repeating the complaint that inefficient plants were being operated while better ones were shut down, and much generation capacity lay idle while load-shedding was imposed upon the citizenry.

It is high time clarity was obtained on this matter. What is animating Nepra, and can the ministry issue a clear statement responding to the regulator’s allegation? There is an insidious undertone to the charges which should be addressed as quickly as possible. For its part, can Nepra explain why it argues in one year that the government’s generation plans are insufficient to meet its own targets, and the next year accepts that the generation targets can be met but there is insufficient transmission capacity to manage the augmented load? Changing the nature of its claims from one year to the next gives the impression that the regulator’s complaints are lacking in depth, perhaps even frivolous. The power sector is seeing some of the largest investments in Pakistan these days, and it is important that the environment in which this is happening is free from needless controversy. Greater transparency is the best way forward, and although the power sector maintains a strong disclosure regime, with project details and tariff determinations all posted on Nepra’s website, if there are so many complaints from the regulator then clearly more is needed. Perhaps the ministry ought to seriously consider a proposal to make some of the information from its own dashboard, which shows total generation from each individual plant in the country in real time, publicly available online. And an explanation of the merit order list for power plants would also help dispel the implications of Nepra’s complaint.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2016