PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has voiced reservation about the exclusion of its proposed power projects from the federal government’s 2020-2047 energy plan and asked the power regulator to review the move.

The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority promised to look into the province’s grievances.

Adviser to chief minister on energy and power Himayatullah Khan told Dawn that the hydel projects proposed by the province for the Indicative Generation Capacity Expansion Plan (IGCEP) 2047 weren’t part of the latest version of the plan, which was released in April this year.

“We conveyed our concerns to the Nepra during a video link hearing on IGCEP 2047 on Wednesday. Chief Minister Mahmood Khan led KP’s team,” he said.

According to officials, the IGCEP prepared by theNational Transmission and Dispatch Company and approved by the Nepra provides a comprehensive view of the future electricity demand forecast, the existing power generating system and future power generation options in addition to the expansion study results.

Mr Himayatullah said the plan only included the province’s ongoing projects of 117 megawatts, while the proposed projects were missing from it.

Power regulator promises to look into province’s grievances

He said the chief minister expressed reservation about the exclusion of projects from the plan and was very dissatisfied with the work done by the NTDC.

The adviser said hydel power was the province’s economic mainstay and if it was not properly reflected in the proposed electricity generation plan, the province was at loss.

He said the chief minister also conveyed to the meeting that the province instead of giving its own electricity to national grid would provide it to local industriels to offset the locational advantage of the province.

“Since up to 70 per cent cost of hydel power included only civil works, they should have be given priority over thermal and coal based plants,” he said.

Mr Himayatullah said the Nepra listened to the province’s grievances and its chairman promisedto look into them.

Meanwhile, a statement issued here said the chief minister told the Nepra hearing that the province had a potential capacity of producing more than 30,000 megawatts of electricity, which could be utilised to address energy crisis in the country.

During the hearing, the provincial government’s team insisted that for the first time, the Nepra published the IGCEP in Feb 2019 wherein the province’s hydropower projects were ignored.

The statement said following objections by the KP Energy Development Organisation (Pedo), Nepra had issued directives to the NTDC to include the province’s hydropower projects in the revised plan but in the revised publication of the plan in April 2020, the details provided by the provincial government were ignored once again.

It added that the Pedo rejected the proposed plan and submitted comprehensive comments about it for consideration.

The statement said the province’s team voiced serious observations about the exclusion of its hydropower projects in the plan and declared the move an injustice to the province and declared that it was not acceptable to the provincial government in any case.

The chief minister demanded the inclusion of all hydropower projects proposed by the province in the plan.

The Nepra chairman assured him that the province’s grievances would be given a serious consideration and necessary steps would be taken to include the province’s projects in the revised energy plan.

Published in Dawn, July 17th, 2020