LAHORE: Chief Executive Lahore Electric Supply Company (Lesco) Mujahid Pervaz Chattah said on Friday the Lesco system is set to manage about 1000 megawatt industrial load with the start of load shedding of gas in winter. He said he has been discussing the issue in detail with Ministry of Power Division over the last two weeks.

"The nutshell of my meetings is that Lesco's distribution system and supply position has been well managed to digest this new addition of load from industrial consumers."

He was sharing his load management strategy with Business Recorder in case the industrial load is shifted back to Lesco system in winter. He said the sanctioned load of industrial consumers on the Lesco network is around 1200 megawatt.

"We can easily accommodate it if industrial consumers swing their load back to our system during winter. That would not be a problem for us," he added. In terms of load factor, he said, domestic consumption tops with above 70 percent, including 30 percent load of air conditioners. It is followed by the industrial load, which is around 20 to 25 percent and finally the agricultural load, which is only 2 percent.

Unfortunately, he pointed out that the growth in industrial load had reduced to minus 2 percent during the last two years due to the high electricity tariff on the one hand and RLNG-based in-house generation by the industry on the other.

He said the government has taken a good initiative by lowering tariff and putting an end to the charges of peak hour, which was the main factor behind the limited share of industry in power consumption.

Prior to the last two years, he added, the growth rate of industrial consumption was in between seven to 10 percent. He said he was confident that the industrial load rate would be back into positive territory in 2021 keeping in view the recent initiatives of the present government. He said the government has offered 25 percent relief if the industrial consumer consumes additional energy as compared to the previous year. I have found industrialists very happy over this development during my interaction with them at business associations, he added.

When asked about the possible burden on the system in case of additional consumption comparing to last year, he said it would add another pressure of 300 megawatt on the system and Lesco is ready to absorb it.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020