Need for utilising water, coal for power generation stressed

[Naveed Yaseen]

KARACHI: The row between federal and provincial governments has caused further delay in grappling with the energy crisis in the country, said Rune Stroem, Country Director for Pakistan, Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Speaking at the conference “Energy and Sustainable Development” organised in parallel with Pakistan Oil, Gas and Energy Exhibition (Pogee), he said Pakistan has vast opportunities to generate electricity through coal, water and other alternate resources, which are lying idle to be utilises in a fruitful purposes. He said the prolong issue of circular debt has worsen the electricity generation which has caused a shortfall of 1000 to 5,000MW power in the country.

Stroem stressed the government to perform its role of facilitation in the businesses. However the government should promote public and private partnership in order to attract handsome investments toward energy related projects, he added.

Director ADB asked the government to frame integrated energy modeled to facilitate all the stakeholders of the energy industry and formulate standard pricing mechanism to streamline energy projects for attracting new investors.

The government should also ensure the security of foreign workforces and investors particularly in the restive areas of the country so the offshore development projects could be conducted smoothly and uninterrupted. Renowned figure of energy sector, former Managing Director Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC), Munawar Baseer Ahmad also gave his presentation on the prevailing energy crisis and factors evolved behind it.

He termed coal resources as a better source for power generation, adding the other alternate projects of Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) imports and Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline are not financially viable for country.

The government has agreed to buy Iran’s gas at 70-80 percent prices of crude oil, which bears no advantage of this deal, and the country should import crude oil to meet its domestic demands instead, he said.

“It (government) is still not cleared about IPI pricing, the confusion over pipe’ diameter and security concerns are very much unresolved,” he added. He pointed out the government is lacking policies regarding the utilisation of coal resources despite establishing many boards to work on development projects.

“We have discovered Thar coal resources 20 years ago and we have not any bankable feasibility report since then,” he said. The chairman of the session, Hilal A Raza, Director Hydrocarbon Development Institute of Pakistan, in one of his concluding remarks, said the Pakistan does not have any expert on coal. Other notables figures of the energy sector also spoke the conference.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...2009_pg5_4