The word 'energy', drawn from French 'energie' and Greek 'energeia', stands for force and vigour. Energy being the ability to do work, electric power is regarded as one of its most effective and clean resources.
It is amongst the most important discoveries and inventions of mankind. It works wonders, as is evident from the fact that electricity-propelled machines transform scorching heat into pleasant cool and freezing cold into soothing warmth; it shapes nights into days; works the industry; whips up the economy and embodies prosperity.
It is a catalyst to development. Modern life is unimaginable without electric power.
The organisations, entrusted with the sensitively important task of power generation and its onwards transport to end-consumers, are of immense significance because of the fact that their performance, besides other contributing factors, set the direction of history, pertaining to economic strength as electricity is an indicator of the growth and lifeline of a nation.
A realistic and scientific planning for reliable power generation and its supply system is an essential for a strong economy.
All future developments of a country depend on a dependable power system. The realisation brought the Pakistan Water and Power Development Authority into being, in 1958, for an integrated development of water and power resources of the country with a competent professional work force.
The charter of duties assigned to WAPDA requires the organisation to investigate, plan and execute projects in water and power sectors and also operate and maintain projects in the power sector covering generation, transmission and distribution of electrical energy in the country.
For an idea of the success story of WAPDA, a symbol of unity and integrity of Pakistan, as it operates as one of the largest integrated power systems of the world; let us peep through its history.
At the time of its emergence in 1947, Pakistan inherited 60 MW of power generation capability with an average production of 142 million units of energy annually, for a population of 31.5 million, yielding 4.5 units per capita consumption.
After 12 years, when the power sector was handed over to WAPDA from the provinces in 1959, the generation capacity had crawled to 119 MW. By then, the country had entered the phase of development and thus required a sustainable infrastructure.
Electricity, being the -- its most significant part was on top and the task of accelerating power infrastructure development was entrusted to WAPDA.
Taking the bull by the horns, WAPDA took off with a number of power generation projects with an allied transmission network matching with the existing and expanding distribution system, to cater for the ever-increasing load.
The professional approach to resolving the multifarious problems did not take long to become evident.
In the first five years of its operations, the electricity generation capability shot up to 636 MW, from 119 and power generation to about 2,500 million units from 781 million.
The density of the consumption system rose from 278 thousand consumers to 688 thousand in 1959.
Only 609 villages enjoyed the facility of electricity at that time. The organisation achieved notable success to the benefit of the rural masses by providing the utility to 1,882 villages, in 1965.
The phenomenal progress turned a new leaf into a blossoming of the social, technical and economic structures of the country.
Mechanised agriculture took off, industrialisation picked up and general living standards improved.
Once having gained momentum, the wheel of development in the power sector, vis-à-vis the water sector, picked up speed. A tremendous increase in generating capability with the installation of numerous hydel and thermal power units was recorded in the following years.
The total generation capacity of WAPDA from its own hydel as well as thermal sources now stands at 10,564 MW (5,879 MW Hydel and 4,685 MW thermal).
The absolute completion of 1450 MW Ghazi Barotha Hydropower Project is also in the offing. As at present, four out of the five units, with a capacity of 290 MW each, in their commercial operation are already contributing to the national grid at the rated capacity.
The last and final Unit 5 will also be going into commercial operation in the near future. Out of a total 16,634 MW capacity of the WAPDA system, the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant in public and the IPPs in the private sector are pooling 6,070 MW to the WAPDA system.
Hectic work is going on to achieve a number of Hydel projects planned to match the on-the-increase demand of electricity with a primary objective of rationalising power tariff, high due to the escalating fossil fuel prices, effecting the high cost of thermal power generation which is nearly 70 percent in the WAPDA system.
The corresponding augmentation of the countrywide transmission and distribution system has taken the facility of electricity to around 13.8 million consumers (83 percent domestic) benefiting homes by providing them with light enabling them to run household gadgets and appliances, causing trade centers to flourish, propelling the wheels of industry and agricultural tube-wells.
Besides, over 78,000 villages and settlements have also been, for now, provided with this facility of the modern age, grossly contributing to the uplift of the agricultural sector which remains the backbone of the national economy, bringing the rural areas as well as masses in the mainstream of the social fabric with an improvement in their living and socio-economic standards.
Electric power is reaching the end-consumers through a country-wide network of 37,000 KMs of transmission lines, 649 grid stations and 3,33,800 KMs of distribution lines.
For a country like ours, the key factor for self-reliance in power sector development is optimal utilisation of low-cost hydro-electric power resource. Hydropower is the most important, non-polluting renewable resource of energy.
Pakistanis are fortunate, as they are blessed with an economically exploitable potential of around 40,000 MW. It is a pity that in the decade of the 1980s, to meet the power shortage in Pakistan, dependence remained more on thermal power development due to its less gestation period, rather than on cheaper hydropower because of the constraints on the exploitation of the energy resource as well as tapping it, resource, of energy and a bounty of nature. The subsequent result was a drastic increase in the power tariff.
National demand for electricity had been and would keep on growing, with the upcoming large scale new investment in the productive sectors of the economy, in this globally adjudged investment friendly country.
Thus, a sizeable injection of cheap hydropower is a viable option to bring the electricity cost within affordable limits. WAPDA, in the late 90s, after the revival of its chartered role pertaining to the development of water and hydropower resources, in line with the new government policy, has already embarked upon the correct choice to beat the increasing electricity demand through hydropower generation.
A gigantic "National Water and Hydropower Development Programme - Vision 2025" is currently underway for the purpose. A number of hydropower projects including the Mangla Dam Raising, Allah Khan, Duber and Keyal Khwar, Golen Gol, New Bong, Jinnah Barrage, Malakand-III, Matiltan, Daral Khwar, Summer Gah, Low head hydels have been initiated among the host of prioritised projects, in both the public and private sectors.
These projects are bound to add a sizeable quantum of low-cost hydropower energy to the national grid.
In the water sector we are moving forward from the Indus Basin Projects of the Tarbela, Mangla Dams, inter-river link canals, barrages and syphons, the otherwise built dams, canals and Salinity Control and Reclamation Projects (SCARPS) to meet the rising demand of the times, by further tapping the natural water resources, to develop water reservoirs to overcome water scarcity and help the country's agricultural sector.
WAPDA, besides the country's largest development organisation, is a gigantic utility covering the entire spectrum of our economy.
With a number of gleaming feathers in its cap, it is obliged to achieve many more milestones in its field of water and power resources development in the coming years.
Rightly so, determined to, it is on the move with the aims and objectives of serving the people and the country with excellence.
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