WEDNESDAY JUNE 27: Power supply to federal, provincial governments, public, private sector departments: Cabinet asks ministries to recover dues

ISLAMABAD: The government has directed Ministries of Finance and Water and Power to recover outstanding electricity dues from all the federal and provincial governments, departments and private sector. The Ministry of Finance has been directed to consider deducting outstanding dues of public sector defaulters through federal adjuster.
Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf told the Cabinet meeting that he had directed Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources to ensure a daily uninterrupted supply of 28,000 tons of furnace oil to power sector to generate an additional 1200 MW electricity for the national grid. "I would instruct Ministry of Water and Power to recover the outstanding dues of Wapda from all the Federal/provincial governments/departments and private sector entities, without any discrimination. In case of default by the Government Departments, Ministry of Finance should consider deducting the outstanding dues through federal adjuster.
The Cabinet meeting was convened to discuss energy crisis and Secretary Water and Power apprised the Cabinet that since the first meeting on June 23, 2012, almost 2000 MW of electricity had been added to the national grid and another 1000 MW would be added to the system in the next few days. The secretary assured the meeting that the situation of loadshedding would ease gradually. However, some members of the Cabinet reportedly stated that there was no let-up in loadshedding despite an addition of 2000 MW to the system during the last couple of days.
According to a press release, the Prime Minister directed the Ministry of Water and Power to ensure that there would be no loadshedding during 'Sehri' and 'Iftar' in Ramazan, commencing from next month. The Petroleum Minister informed the Cabinet that he had issued instructions regarding the release of 28000 tons of fuel oil for the power plants to increase generation of power by about 1500 MW within next two to three weeks.
Raja Ashraf directed the Minster for Railways to make special arrangements for early transportation of fuel oil so that the same could be used for power generation. The Minister for Railways said three special trains had been arranged for the purpose and the supply of the fuel oil would be ensured at the earliest keeping in view the urgency to generate more electricity for consumers.
The Secretary Water and Power was quite upbeat at the prospects of meeting the target of more than 15000 MW during the next two to three weeks as the melting of the glaciers was getting momentum. The Secretary said the supply-demand gap would be narrowed on account of an increase in hydel power generation. Minister for Information and Broadcasting Qamar Zaman Kaira dispelled the impression that more than 600MW of electricity would be taken out of the KESC system to add to the national grid to ease the situation of loadshedding in rest of the country.
The Minister said an amount of electricity would be available to KESC by making its gas-fired plants operational through availability of gas, "which is company's preferred option." Therefore, the question of disconnects electricity supply to KESC was simply misplaced and a mere conjecture, the Minister added. The Prime Minister also directed the Energy Committee to work out a plan aimed at minimising line losses and theft of electricity. The Prime Minister also underscored the importance of pursuing the objective of recovery of arrears to make the sector sustainable The Prime Minister said that conservation was an important component of the strategy to overcome electricity crisis.