LAHORE: The Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) has said that it will add 400 megawatts (MW) of cheap electricity to the national grid by the mid of next year. This will be done through the completion of six hydropower projects under-construction across the country, said Wapda Chairman Raghib Shah.
The distribution company, for the first time, is in negotiations with local banks to secure finance for mega-projects as international donors are reluctant to fund them.
Wapda has 20 hydropower projects in the pipeline, keeping in view the growing energy and water demand of the country. Once completed, the project will have a total capacity of producing 20,000MW of cheap power and store 12 million acre feet of water.
Shah, while briefing the media about the overall situation of hydel projects on Tuesday, said that if Wapda had access to funds, the company would be able to add 5,000MW of electricity in the next five years, and another 14,000MW by 2020.
“We are financially constrained; however negotiations with different donor agencies and banks to fund the projects are underway. We seek $500 million from local banks for completion of projects, besides this we are accumulating our own resources,” he said. We are waiting for Rs90 billion to be released by the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC) to reconcile outstanding dues and once we get the money things will start getting smooth, Shah said.
Shah declared Diamer Bhasha Dam as a priority for Wapda, for which Rs13.78 billion had been sanctioned for fiscal 2013, as construction of the Kalabagh Dam cannot move forward without provincial consensus. “We are in touch with different funding agencies to complete Diamer Bhasha,” he said.
Shah also highlighted 12 under-construction small and medium hydel projects under-construction, having a total capacity of 400MW.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 28th, 2012.
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TOPI !!
@Shahid Butt: Butt Sb, considering our govt's record of defaulting on sovereign guarantees how many people would trust them enough to buy these bonds?
Why don't they issue Bonds by state govt to raise the funds, like backed by Sind or Baluchistan or Punjab .It can be done with backing of federal govt. Money can be raised thru stock market. In 1960's USA built high way system (multi billion dollars project) by issuing bonds which were backed by both state and federal govt.These bonds were from one yr to 30 yrs maturity. Why can' t we follow this kind of example and raise the fund locally.