Federal Minister for Water and Power Parvez Ashraf said here on Saturday that the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (Ecnec) has approved Rs 17 billion for widening the Karakoram Highway (KKH) to facilitate timely completion of Bhasha Dam. The Ecnec has approved this amount two days earlier, to do away with the infrastructure hurdles, he added.
The Minister was addressing a press conference at the Wapda House. Wapda Chairman Shakeel Durani and other members of the Authority were also present on the occasion. Earlier, the Ministry had organised a briefing to the 10-member National Assembly standing committee on water and power at the Wapda House. Ghulam Mustafa Shah, Chairman of the committee also interacted with the press and made a point that no development on Kala Bagh dam was possible without consensus among all four provincial assemblies.
The Minister for Water and Power said that the present government has reviewed and re-activated all electricity generation relating projects on war footing basis and gap between demand and supply would be overcome by December 2009.
Regarding desilting of canals, starting from December 20 up to January 20, the minister said his ministry would rely on thermal generation to mitigate the impact of imminent load shedding by then. He said the ministry was ensuring that all thermal houses are generating electricity on full capacity.
According to him, the thermal generation units had been facing gas shortage but timely intervention by the President and the Prime Minister had ensured availability of 100 mmcfd gas to these units against required quantity of 320 mmcfd during summer. Earlier, this shortage of gas was touching the level of 10 mmcfd, but on intervention by the President and the Prime Minister had increased this quantity relatively.
Ashraf said the ministry has chalked out a long term policy of tackling with energy demand up to 2015 and proper plans are already in place in this respect. He said the Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco) was also facing a circular debt of Rs 400 billion, out of which it had to recover Rs 250 billion and to pay Rs 150 billion.
He said that availability of water in both Mangla and Tarbela dams was 35 percent less comparing with previous year and both provinces, Sindh and Punjab, were ensuring that no indent would be put forward. It affected the hydel generation, which dwindled to 1500 MW from 5000 MW.
The minister said an addition of 5000 MW electricity to the system would help the government to overcome load shedding and it is possible by December 2009. Regarding tariff re-adjustment, he said that the government was involved in consulting experts from different walks of life and a revised tariff would be announced soon.
"As instructed by the President and the Prime Minister, minimum burden will be shifted to the middle and lower middle class," said the minister, adding: "Those who are consuming 50 MW electricity monthly are 4.6 million and the middle class is not using more than 300 MW in general."
According to him, the general sales tax is integral part of taxes and the government would have no option but to pass it on. However, he made it clear that the revised tariff would be determined on prevailing prices of furnace oil.
Regarding comments passed by Public Accounts Committee Chairman on Wapda audit report for 2005-06, the minister said he intended to defend Wapda, but he would clarify that Wapda has not set up a state within a state. However, improvement in the system is underway. According to him, introduction of smart meters and prepaid card system would ease down line losses of Wapda.