Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) is causing colossal monthly loss of Rs 1 billion to Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco) and its total arrears have reached Rs 80 billion till date, the newly-promoted Managing Director, Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco), Tahir Basharat Cheema said on Thursday.
Similarly, he said, huge arrears of about Rs 84 billion are recently restructured in the case of Karachi Electricity Supply Company (KESC). The KESC issue has been resolved extensively, as new operators have signed an implementation agreement and they would make payment against the electricity consumed ahead.
They further agreed that the KESC would not get more than 500 MW of electricity against present level of 600-800 MW daily. He was giving a media briefing on issues relating to power generation, distribution and conservation at a local hotel. Cheema apprehended that consumers would have to face six to eight hours of load shedding in worst scenario in next four months.
'The situation would be highly improved comparing with the last year,' he said. Further, 'I do not see a load shedding of more than six to eight hours, in case the load increases heavily on the system and no tangible conservation takes place.' According to him, Pepco system can save 500-800 MW electricity through its heavily advertised energy conservation campaign. However, he added that the response from the commercial sector to its energy conservation campaign was subdued.
Cheema however pointed out that an end to the forced closure was his prime mandate as a new MD Pepco. Further, Cheema said 550 MW has already been added to the system compared with the previous year and another 450 MW is going to add to the system during current month.
He also said the domestic consumers were facing the brunt of the current power crisis, as 5000 MW electricity to the industry and 1600 MW electricity to defence, hospitals and jails cannot be interrupted in any case. He said a revenue task force has been set up at Pepco, which would soon make many startling facts public. Pepco has also initiated a campaign against power theft. 'We are improving operational efficiency and recovery at Pepco,' he said.
Pepco has a installed capacity of 17959 MW in its system but the maintenance and forced closure issues reduces the generation capacity to 14400 MW in summer season, he stated. 'The load reaches to the level of 17500 MW quickly and the whole system chokes,' he added. Further, he recalled that the power crisis started in 2002, when the system experienced a shortfall of 86 MW, followed by 5000 MW in 2007-08 and 4215 MW in 2008-09.
According to him, the previous regime kept on banking upon the private sector for new power plants, which had though pledged 30,000 MW generation through Private Power Infrastructure Board, but not a single plant was added to the system.