Water and Power: Committee recommends ministry to implement five-slab tariff

Parliamentary panel laments high cost of Nandipur power project.

ISLAMABAD:

In a bid to provide relief to the masses, the Parliamentary panel on Monday recommended the power ministry to implement the five-slab power tariff and charge bills accordingly. 

The slabs determine the price-per-unit a consumer pays, which increases with higher usage of electricity.

While expressing concerns over absence of the water and power ministers as well as the secretaries, the panel lamented that the government was spending money on conducting an audit rather than resolving the slabs’ issue. It said the tariff was currently being charged according to just two slabs.

“The committee has written a letter to the power ministry to implement the five-slab tariff structure in a bid to provide relief to the consumers but no action has been taken so far,” Chairman Senate Standing Committee on Water and Power Senator Zahid Khan said during a meeting held in Islamabad. He added that despite the regulator, National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra), admitting the need to increase the number of slabs, the step was being delayed.

“We have found a mistake and the regulator has admitted it,” he said, adding the Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, seemed to have brushed it under the carpet by directing an adjustment in power bills and asking to conduct the audit as well.

Senator Haji Adeel said consumers had received hefty power bills yet again despite the prime minister’s directives of an adjustment.

The power ministry officials said that two private companies were conducting the audit of power bills and were due to submit the report within two weeks. Meanwhile, the committee was also concerned over the escalating cost of the Neelum Jhelum and Nandipur power projects, directing the ministry to provide details of their tender and funding.

Khan lamented that the 450MW Nandipur plant would be operated on furnace oil and high speed diesel, generating power at Rs36 per unit. Instead, he said, it would have been better to abandon the project.

“It had been better to abandon this project,” he said, terming the Nandipur power plant “a white elephant”.

“If government is buying power from Independent power Plants (IPPs) at Rs14 to Rs 16 per unit, why should it set up the Nandipur power plant,” he said. Senator Shahi Syed said the government should have preferred dams rather than the Nandipur power plant. “It is the negligence of power ministry and concerned departments,” he said.

On the other hand, Managing Director Nandipur power project Muhammad Mahmood said the two turbines with 95.6MW capacity had been completed, adding that the project could not be abandoned now as 50% work had been completed.

“The country could face a loss of $350 million,” he said, disclosing at the same time that the project would generate power at Rs36 per unit.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 28^th, 2014.

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