ISLAMABAD: A Senate panel on Tuesday asked the government not to charge more than 13 per cent system losses to paying consumers, increase fine on non-performing power companies and immediately appoint two provincial members – Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa – to the power regulator.

This was the crux of a meeting of the Senate Standing Committee on Cabinet presided over by Senator Talha Mahmood of JUI-F in which the PTI government testified that the country’s generation capacity had gone up to 30,000MW but serious transmission challenges did not allow more than 20,000 sustained supply.

Chairman National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) Tariq Saddozai told the committee that regulator comprised a chairman appointed by the federal government through a transparent process and four members, one member each nominated by all the four provinces.

He said the position of member Sindh was lying vacant for four months and that of KP for a month and a half.

The committee asked State Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan to work with the federal energy minister and provincial chief ministers of Sindh and KP for early nomination of Nepra members at the earliest.

Responding to question, the Nepra chief said the regulator had fixed standards for the power generation, transmission and distribution companies and the violator faced fines and penalties. During past few years fine up to Rs5 million was imposed on the companies not generating enough electricity. The committee observed that fines were not enough for the sufferings of the consumers and should be increased.

Endorsing the claims of the previous government of additional electricity generation, State Minister Ali Muhammad Khan said the country has the capability of generating 30,000MW, but the previous government did not pay much attention on development of transmission system that can deliver no more than 20,000MW load.

The Nepra chief told the committee five grid stations were planned for development in KP but none could be completed so far. As per contract, 220kV Mansehra, 220kV Chakdara, 220kV D.I Khan and 220kV Nowshera grid stations were required to be completed by December 2016, but these were still far from completion, causing low voltage and outages in those areas.

Senator Talha Mehmood said there would have been no load shedding now if the previous government had paid attention to the upgradation of transmission line as well. He said the electricity shortfall was the major reason behind increasing trade gap as imports touched $55bn while exports fell to $20bn.

The Nepra chairman told the committee that there were 27 million power consumers including 85 per cent domestic,11pc commercial, 1.2pc industrial and 1.8pc agriculture consumers. Around 50pc of the power was being consumed by the domestic consumers while 25pc is consumed by industrial sector, he said

He said permissible technical losses stood at 13pc while some Discos were allowed additional 3pc security losses. Similarly, the electricity theft was about 5.6pc. He said the technical losses in developed countries were less than 10pc but on the directives of government, the technical losses were increased to 18pc in consumer tariff in Pakistan and the burden is borne by the power consumers.

Mr Saddozai told the committee that all the grid stations and transmission lines were overloaded in the country and required complete overhauling and upgradation.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2018