Additional Secretary Ministry of Water and Power, Hassan Nasir Jamy told this to the Senate Standing Committee on Water and Power, which met with Senator Taj Haider in the chair at the Parliament House Friday. He said that drafts of National Energy Plan and Integrated Generation, Transmission and Distribution Plan have been prepared and would be finalised after consultation with the provinces. He said that the consultation process with the provinces would be completed within three months.
He said these plans would be approved in the mid of 2017 and implemented at the end of 2017. He said that purpose of the plans is to block mushroom growth of power projects and prepare future strategy. He said that National Energy Plan has been prepared in consultation with Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA), National Transmission & Despatch Company (NTDC) and others. He said that the plans would also be discussed in Council of Common Interest (CCI). He said that the CASA-1000 power project would also be part of these plans. The chief of Islamabad Electric Supply Company (IESCO) told the committee that these programmes will help prioritise the power projects in future.
Senator Nauman Wazir Khattak said that thermal and oil energy sources would end after 15 to 20 years. "Today, we will have to think conversion of power projects on alternative sources of energy. We will have to shift on wind, solar and other sources of energy."
The IESCO chief said, "For this purpose we are preparing National Energy Plan to convert and launch projects on solar, wind and other sources of energy." The committee recommended the Ministry of Water and Power to prepare projects with the help of experts and researchers to launch new projects and shift old power projects on solar, wind and other sources of energy.
Senator Nauman Wazir Khattak said that there would be an issue of operation and maintenance of thermal and coal projects in future, which are being constructed under China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and the cost of electricity generation would increase.
The additional secretary of Ministry of Water and Power said that fuel mix has been changed after 1990 due to installation of independent power producers (IPPs). He said that it has reduced dependence on hydel power. He said that share of wind increased from 0% to 1%, coal from 0% to 0.1%, hydel from 34% to 37.8%, gas 33.5% to 35% and nuclear power 4.1% to 4.3% etc.
He said that as compared to the world, Pakistan's power share is 35% on oil while in the world it is 6%, Pakistan's share of hydel energy is 34 % while in the world it is 16%, Pakistan nuclear power share is 1.5 % while world is on 15%. He said that the cost of electricity generation has been decreased due to low price of oil in the international market.
The members of the committee from Balochistan expressed concern over more than 16 hours load shedding in the province. However, the committee deferred the briefing on the issue from CEO of Quetta Electric Supply Company (QESCO) as he could not attend the meeting of the committee due to flight delay.