‘KE to invest $2b in system in next three years’

CEO says situation would have been different if utility was allowed to set up 700MW power plant in 2016

KARACHI:

Apologising to citizens for extended load-shedding in the metropolis, K-Electric (KE) CEO Moonis Alvi claimed the power utility planned to invest $2 billion on its infrastructure in the next three years.

Addressing a press conference on Wednesday, Alvi said the company planned to invest in a 900 megawatt RLNG power plant, as well as upgrading its infrastructure.

He pointed out that the Centre had also committed to expedite infrastructure upgrades for the national grid, so that KE could receive an additional 300MW of power in 2021, further 400MW in 2022 and 800MW in 2023. This, he said, would allow KE to put in place large-scale power projects that would give the metropolis a power surplus.

According to Alvi, the city's power demand was around 3,500MW, but KE could only supply 3,200MW at the moment. "The situation would have been different if we had been granted permission to install a 700MW power plant in 2016."

He also claimed that load-shedding was in line with the National Power Policy, 2013, and was carried out entirely on account of power theft. "We did not carry out load-shedding from March 20 to May 28. And even in areas with extremely high levels of power theft, load-shedding does not exceed 8 hours," he said, adding that they informed customers of load-shedding beforehand.

"Sometimes faults or tripping can occur but we fix them on priority basis even with the pandemic creating workforce challenges," Alvi went on to say.

Regarding complaints of overbilling, he asserted that the power tariff was set by the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) and KE could not increase or decrease it. "The federal ombudsman had 30 offices in Karachi to handle overbilling complaints, but 99 per cent decisions end up in our favour," he added.

Alvi also refuted reports that KE used cheaper fuel for power generation. He further added that the power company was owed Rs267 billion by the Centre, Sindh and their subsidiaries.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 16^th, 2020.