PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Caretaker Chief Minister, Muhammad Azam Khan here Saturday stressed to increase power generation in KP and said that completion of ongoing power generation projects would not only add electricity to national grid but also help increasing income of the province.
He was chairing the 13th policy board meeting of Pakhtunkhwa Energy Development Organization (PEDO). The meeting was also attended by Caretaker Minister for Energy, Ahmad Jan, Additional Chief Secretary, Zubair Asghar Qureshi, Secretary Finance, Ayaz Khan, Secretary Law, Sagufta Naveed, Secretary Energy, Tashfeen Haider, Chief Executive Officer PEDO, Engr. Naeem Khan and other board members.
On the occasion, the Chief Minister was presented annual report of PEDO for the year 2022-23. Caretaker CM expressed satisfaction over PEDO performance expressing hope that PEDO would ensure timely completion of energy generation projects to enhance energy generation capacity of the province and provide cheap electricity to people.
The meeting also approved current budget estimate of PEDO for 2023-24 and revised budget for 2022-23. The meeting was told that revenue of Rs. 47 billion has been generated by energy projects of PEDO and seven hydropower projects of 162 MW have been competed under PEDO while five power generating projects are in final stages of completion.
The meeting was informed that work is in progress on 13.5 MW Chappari Charkhel project and 6.9 MW Mujahideen hydropower projects while work has been started on 300 MW Balakot Hydropower project with financial assistance of Asian Development Bank. The work would soon start on 88 MW Gabral Kalam project and 157 MW Madayn hydropower project.
Participants of meeting were briefed that Civil Secretariat, CM House and CM secretariat have been converted to solar power while 8000 schools, 187 Basic Health Units and 4000 Masajid have also been converted to solar power.
PEDO has also converted 300 Masajid of merged districts to solar power. It was told that 356 mini micro hydropower projects are completed in Phase I while work is underway on 291 power projects under Phase II.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023