Power production has hit new peak, but load-shedding continues

Ministry states generation has touched 17,720MW, eclipsing the record hit last Ramazan

ISLAMABAD: With consumers reeling from prolonged load-shedding that disrupts daily chores and businesses, the Ministry of Water and Power boasted that electricity generation touched a new record high at 17,720 megawatts on Wednesday at 3 in the afternoon.

Last year, power production had peaked at 17,430MW on June 19 during the month of Ramazan. In the fresh record, hydroelectric power contributed 5,240MW, state-owned generation companies (Gencos) 2,901MW and independent power producers (IPPs) 9,579MW.



Still, the overall electricity output fell short of the demand for around 21,000MW during summer months. The deficit sometimes goes beyond 6,000MW leading to load-shedding for eight hours and more in a day, which also sparks sporadic protests from angry consumers.

The electricity supply situation is even worse in rural areas as demand soars because of extremely hot weather.

Despite all this, Federal Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Muhammad Asif, while congratulating the nation as well as his ministry’s team, reiterated the government’s resolve that it would take every step for resolving electricity production, supply and demand challenges.

The increase in power generation would help bridge the demand-supply gap and maximum relief was being passed on to consumers.

A ministry spokesman said all distribution companies managed the supply of electricity according to the announced schedule across the country. “Not a single megawatt of forced load-shedding was conducted in the entire country despite a steep rise in demand,” he said. All the distribution companies were efficiently managing the distribution of electricity load, he said, adding special teams had been formed to undertake immediate operations for restoring power supply in case of local faults.

The spokesman pointed out that distribution companies had announced their schedule at the local level and complaint centres had been revived for immediately addressing public grievances.



Another official claimed that there was no load-shedding in areas connected to the feeders where transmission and distribution losses stood low and recoveries were high.

In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, he said, 252 feeders faced no load-shedding because of 100% bill recovery in those regions.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 18^th, 2017.

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