ISLAMABAD, Sept 1: The federal government on Thursday decided to set up two thermal power plants of 900-mw in the Wapda system and provide additional 300-mw power supply to the Karachi Electric Supply Corporation by 2007 to overcome power shortages.
The decision to this effect was taken at a meeting presided over by Water and Power Minister Liaqat Ali Jatoi, on the directives of the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the cabinet.
The country, said the sources, was estimated to face a power shortfall of about 1,240-mw in Wapda and the KESC system and hence immediate measures were required to meet the additional demand well before time.
The meeting directed Wapda to choose two locations out of three already identified by it, including Nandipur, Lahore and Faisalabad. The two projects would have a power generation capacity of 450-mw each having a total cost of about Rs35 billion and would be completed by 2007.
Wapda has been asked to submit details in this regard within three weeks for further procedure and international competitive bidding.
Federal Secretary Water and Power, Advisor Water and Power, Chairman WAPDA, Senior officers of power and petroleum ministries, WAPDA and Planning Division attended the meeting.
The meeting reviewed in detail the actual supply and demand position of 2005-06 to 2009-10, load forecast scenarios and short and medium term plan to meet the required demand.
The meeting also decided that more than 300-mw additional power should be supplied to Karachi Electric Supply Corporation by 2007 to meet the demand of Karachi.
In a detailed presentation, Chairman WAPDA informed the meeting about the current generation capacity of three sources - WAPDA Hydel, GENCOs Thermal and IPPs. The meeting was informed that on the basis of load demand projected at load growth rates, there would be additional demand of 900 MW power by end of June 2007 in the Wapda system.
The minister for Water and Power asked the Wapda authorities to devise a rational strategy to cope with the situation and directed to remove all bottlenecks to meet the future demand as well as to attract more foreign investment in power sector.
He was of the view that the growth rate was going high in power sector which is to be tackled intelligently through adopting measures of installing more power plants for producing sufficient energy to avoid loadshedding in the future.
The minister said that some projects were in the pipeline in the private sector which would be materialized soon. International tenders have also been invited for three other thermal and seven hydel projects.
He also asked the participants to make a long-term plan on actual demand and supply basis to provide electricity to the industrial, commercial and domestic consumers without any delay.