Engro Power Thar Limited (EPTL) and Sindh Engro Coal Mining Company (SECMC) are the largest private investment under CPEC, and the only investments which are 95 percent owned by Pakistanis, Syed Murtaza Azhar Rizvi, Director Mining & Operation Engro Energy Limited told the media.
"On August 1, 2018, the EPTL made history by successfully connecting the power plant with national grid to receive back-feed power supply for plant start up.
The next part of this dream will be achieved by December 2018, when the first electron from Thar Coal will be added to the national grid," he said, adding that the COD is expected to be achieved by May/June 2019.
He said Thar is confronting severe water shortage while on the other hand there is over 9 billion cubic feet water exists under Thar Desert which is less saline than sea water and can be used for fish farming and agriculture. The existence of water was revealed during excavation. Experts have cleared this saline water for limited use. The company has also installed 12 RO plants to make Saline water worthy of use.
He said that with a rising population and an expanding economy, Pakistan's energy needs have outpaced its national energy supply. Exacerbating the demand-supply gap is Pakistan's unsustainable power generation fuel mix, which contains a high share of oil-based power generation up to 32 percent, resulting in high cost of electricity production. Moreover, there is a heavy reliance on imported fuels which results in constant depletion of foreign exchange and insufficient control over the fuels supply chain.
This inappropriate fuel mix leads to energy losses at each level of the value chain and inadequate recoveries lead to power outages, unaffordable electricity and circular debt. He added that SECMC was created with the vision "to develop a technically and commercially viable Coal Mining Project in Thar Block - II to bring energy security to Pakistan". The total reserves of block II are sufficient to support 5000MW of energy for 50 years; enough to pull the country out of the energy crisis.
He said the Thar Coal Mining project is being undertaken by Sindh Engro Coal Mining Company (SECMC) - a Joint Venture Agreement (JVA) between Government of Sindh (GoS), Engro Energy Limited (formerly Engro Powergen Limited) and its Partners namely; Thal Limited (House of Habib), Habib Bank Limited (HBL), Hub Power Company (HUBCO) and China Machinery Engineering Corporation (CMEC). Houlinhe Open Pit Coal Mine, subsidiary of SPI (State Power International) Mengdong (SPIM), formerly CPIM, has joined the SECMC board as strategic investor with preference shares' subscription.
Taking about the CSR initiatives, he further revealed that for the first time in Pakistan, inhabitants of the project area have been made Project Beneficiaries by the Government of Sindh.
This has been achieved by diluting 3 percent of the Government's shareholding for the Project Affected Persons who will become shareholders in the project. In addition, as part of the SGD framework, the company continues to work on key impact areas such as education, health, livelihoods, gender equality, water and women empowerment amongst other focus areas.