PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mahmood Khan on Saturday directed the energy and power department to complete all ongoing projects on time and ensure progress on new ones in line with the respective timelines.

Chairing a meeting on the department’s performance here, the chief minister said his government was working on a number of mega hydropower projects, whose completion would help address energy shortage in the province.

A statement issued here said the meeting was informed that 94 per cent work on Jabori hydropower project in Mansehra district had been completed, while the rest would be completed by the end of the current year.

The project is meant to generate more than 71gw electricity annually.

Officials said 88 per cent work on Karora project in Shangla district had been completed, while the rest would be completed by Jan next year. The project will have the annual power generating capacity of 72gw.

Reviews performance of energy and power department

The officials said 85 per cent work had been completed on 40mw Kotu project in Lower Dir district, while physical progress on 84mw Matiltan project was 47 per cent.

They said the Executive Committee of National Economic Council had approved the 157mw Madayan and 88mw Gabral projects to be executed under the KP Hydropower and Renewable Energy Programme, while 300mw Balakot hydropower project would be executed next year.

The officials said the the newly-formed KP Transmission and Grid System Company had registered itself with the Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan.

They said the company was formed to develop a separate and independent transmission and grid infrastructure of the provincial government for the supply of locally produced electricity to the local industries, special economic zones and other commercial consumers at special rates.

Regarding the micro-hydel power projects in the province, the officials said in the first phase, 307 projects had been completed in 11 districts with a total production capacity of 25,000 kilowatts, while 672 projects would be executed in the second phase.

Regarding the solarisation programme of the department, they informed the meeting that 300 mosques had been solarised in the newly-merged tribal districts, while work had begun on the solarisation of 4,000 more mosques.

The officials said tenders had been issued for the solarisation of 8,000 schools and 187 basic health units across the province.

Published in Dawn, October 11th, 2020