Water and power minister Liaquat Ali Jatoi said here on Friday Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC) will have surplus power supply from Monday.
Addressing a meeting at Alternate Energy Board Office, the minister said both the president and prime minister were concerned over power problem in Karachi and directed him to have close interaction with the KESC to mitigate the sufferings of Karachiites.The minister directed the management of KESC to overcome existing power shortage and breakdowns, so as to provide relief to Karachiites.
KESC CEO Frank Scherschmidt, operation and management partners (Siemens) and senior KESC officials attended the meeting. Jatoi said the government was keen to see the KESC a reliable power supply organisation.
He said that 16-MW power shortage due to tripping should be overcome by providing mobile transformers at over-loaded grid stations. In this connection, the minister directed the KESC CEO to arrange mobile transformers for placement to provide immediate relief to citizens.
During the meeting, Jatoi telephoned the Secretary Petroleum in Islamabad and SSGC managing director to provide 16 mmcfd gas to Steel Mills, so that their power plant could be made functional to generate 20 MW of electricity, which could be supplied to KESC to meet power shortage.
He directed the KESC power plant engineer to assure that unit at Korangi Power Plant, which developed fault few days, should be repaired and put on line by Monday that would help availability of another 20 MW for supply.
He also talked to Hubco officials for starting their under maintenance unit so that additional 25 MW electricity could be made available through Hubco link.
Liaquat Jatoi pointed out that these measures would ensure availability of 81MW, which could help in overcoming the shortage of 44MW as informed by KESC in the meeting and because of which the ongoing load shedding was taking place.
He said he would hold periodic review meeting with KESC to provide relief to Karachiites.
Regarding the arrangements to do away with existing load shedding by Monday, the minister said he would again visit the city for another review meeting with the officials. Frank Scherschmidt informed the meeting that since last meeting with the minister, the corporation was able to have an increased 100 MW power generation through its own resources.
Frank gave a review to the minister regarding utilisation of Rs14 billion provided to the KESC by the government of Pakistan for rehabilitation of power supply system in Karachi.
Frank informed that about Rs6 billion had already been utilised in this regard while remaining Rs 8 billion were included in the current fiscal budget and would be used for constructing nine more grid stations, adding work on three of them was in progress.
He said work was also underway on a Digital Monitoring Load Dispatch Center (SCADA) and would be ready for functioning by April 2007, where after power to the city would be supplied more efficiently and in case of tripping or breakdown, quick remedial steps could be taken.
The minister suggested that maintenance of power supply system should be carried out at proper timings with full co-ordination so that people might not suffer from prolonged power outages.
He said he would ensure maximum help from Wapda and the Federal Ministry of Water and Power to KESC to ensure reliable power supply in Karachi.