The world celebrated 'Earth Hour' on Saturday, March 28, 2010, by dousing lights at 8.30 pm (official time of each country). But we in Pakistan celebrate it day and night, 24/7, courtesy the KESC/Wapda/ or Pepco! And by the looks of it, may be a century would elapse, before the lights are turned on again, and stay so, round the clock!
We lament, curse or boil over in sheer frustration but the powers that be in the power supply chain chant the mantra ad infinitum, blaming it all on Musharraf regime for not having done anything to ameliorate the suffering during their hold at the helm of affairs.
No matter that the present incumbents have themselves been in power for over two years and have done very little (if any) to rectify the situation; they remain quite adamant in their posturing and (unfulfilled) promises of "no load shedding", without moving an inch towards the solution of the problem.
(Correction: they do their best to compensate for the shortage of electricity by increasing the charge per unit of actual or presumed consumption of electricity every other day, and adding on to bills for undefined "arrears" every quarter or half year, to say nothing of inflated bills for "ghost" units which are a mere figment of some busy body's mind they call a meter reader. Woe betide the subscriber who has the gumption to challenge them against this high-handedness, but more about this later).
With scores of possibilities and concrete suggestions for augmenting power generation, either through depleting fossil fuels or renewable energy sources, no progress is on the horizon. For everything we look to Washington to solve our problems for us, and the US government is quite happy to promise some 'peanuts' in an undefined future, to lull us into sleep with pleasant dreams.
Our energy and other pressing requirements may run into trillions of dollars, but our worthy Foreign Minister was quite happy and satisfied with a photo-op-featuring a smiling Hillary, and a promise of releasing Dollars 125 million, out of Kerry/Lugar allocations for an Aladin's Lamp to take care of all our energy needs for generations to come, but on condition that we do not accept any offer of help from Iran! To recapitulate for the umpteenth time, about the indigenous sources and possibilities in our immediate neighbourhood, we repeat what has been told probably millions of times:-
1. Renewable sources of energy:
a) Hydal power
b) Solar energy
c) Wind Power
d) Bio-gas and
e) Tidal energy
2. Fossil fuels, etc:-
A. Thermal power (Coal, gas, or oil-fired)
B. Recycled waste
3. Nuclear energy or Thermo-nuclear energy (Fission-fusion-fission or Hydrogen chain reaction);
3. Energy grid linking neighbouring countries for regular and peak hour surges in demand through transmission lines across countries. This would involve power transmissions between: Iran/Pakistan; Tajikistan/Pakistan; Turkmenistan/ Afghanistan/Pakistan, and link-up with other Central Asian (CIS) energy-rich countries on one hand and China on the other.
All the initiatives so far have faced a 'firewall', because of our bureaucratic obtuseness, or downright bungling (with ulterior motives) or inefficiency. Even our elected worthies are not known for any solid, constructive achievement, save pontification and vote garnering! So it is futile to expect any worth-while attempt at solving the power generation/distribution/cost problem for another century at least, at the rate we are moving!Long Live Earth Hour.......OR Earth Century!!!!!!!
P.S. About costs of generation, transmission and distribution, an unbiased technical study for the relative fields of energy through competent and qualified teams is necessary. As for the charges to the helpless and hapless consumers, all we can hope for is better sense to prevail at the time of next elections.
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