ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has said that significant addition of power to the national grid with the completion of ongoing projects will eliminate load shedding in Pakistan for all times to come.
While chairing a meeting of Cabinet Committee on Energy at the PM House in Islamabad on Tuesday, the prime minister said that never in the history of the country such a huge investment has been made into the energy sector.
Sharif said that the government is not only working to meet the short fall the energy but is also catering for the future energy needs of the Pakistan. He said that increased power generation would also contribute towards economic growth, employment generation, increased industrial activity and foreign investment.
The prime minister said that he would personally monitor the progress on ongoing power projects across the country and will also perform onsite visits of all power projects to ensure their timely completion.
The meeting was attended by Federal Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar, Minister for Petroleum Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Minister for Water & Power Khawaja Muhammad Asif, Chief Minister Punjab Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister Tariq Fatemi and other senior officials.
The Federal Secretary Water and Power Younus Dagha gave detailed briefing on the timeline of the completion of the ongoing power projects in Pakistan.
The prime minister was briefed that the power projects will be completed before March 2018. He was told that the projects which would be completed between the given timeline will include three LNG power plants (Bhikki, Haveli-Bahadur, Baloki (3,600 MW), Chashma 3 & 4 Nuclear (340 MW) each, Guddu Gas (400 MW), Nandipur Gas (100 MW), Sahiwal Coal (1,320 MW), Various Wind/Bagasse (350 MW), Patrind HPP Hydel (147 MW), Faisalabad Gas (250 MW), Neelum Jhelum (969 MW) and Tarbella 4 Extension (1,410 MW) and Port Qasim Power Plant (1,320 MW).
The meeting was assured that total of 11,131 megawatts will be made available to the National Grid by the March of 2018.
The meeting was also briefed that all transmission line projects are on track to evacuate ongoing power projects, and billions of rupees have been invested in the existing distribution network to bear the load of additionally generated power through completion of ongoing power projects.
