ISLAMABAD, March 29: With sufficient water in dams, Wapda on Thursday started drawing about 12,000 cusec of additional water from the Mangla Dam for power generation to overcome the shortfall of about 300mw electricity in the country.

The decision was taken at a meeting held here on Thursday. Minister for Water and Power Liaqat Ali Jatoi presided over the meeting which was attended by representatives of Wapda and the Indus River System Authority.

The power utility will now be in a position to get 760mw electricity from Mangla on 24-hour basis.

Sources said the Mangla dam was producing about 500mw electricity on Wednesday and had touched 700mw in the evening for a couple of hours but now it would provide 760mw on permanent basis. With additional discharges, the releases from Mangla reached 30,000 cusec. The arrangement will remain in place until April 1 when discharges from the Tarbela Dam will increase and the Mangla releases will get regularised in the wake of provincial indents for the Kharif season.

By May and onwards, power demand will grow to a maximum of about 13,200mw and so would rise the provincial demand for irrigation water, making it possible for the utility to produce 6,700mw from hydel sources. The remaining power will come from Wapda’s thermal stations and IPPs. Besides, a 150mw rented power stations has become operational and a 136mw rented power house will become functional in the next few weeks.

Wapda has projected about 6.9 per cent growth in power demand until April and 7.5 per cent for peak summer of June-July.

An official statement said the meeting was informed that 3.7 MAF water would be carried forward for the Kharif season and there would be no water shortage throughout the season even after the discharges for power generation.

The Irsa chairman said inflows in rivers on Thursday were about 83 per cent higher than last year. He said about 124 MAF water would be available at rim stations, which was in surplus of provincial needs.