After Turkish and Chinese companies, a Norwegian company NBT has expressed interest in investing $1 billion to set up a 500 megawatt wind power project in the country to tap the more than 60,000MW of wind power potential spreading from the coastal belt of Balochistan to Sindh.
NBT Chairman Arne Myre made this offer at a meeting with Water and Power Minister Syed Naveed Qamar on Monday. The seven-member delegation of NBT presented its business and investment plan. The delegation would meet with the prime minister along with the minister on Tuesday, an official source said. The Norwegian company had applied for the issuance of letter of interest (LOI) for the 500MW project and said that after issuance of the LOI, the company would complete a 250MW wind project within 18 months. The Sindh government had been asked to allocate suitable land in the wind corridor, the source said.
Pakistan has huge untapped wind energy potential estimated to be over 60,000MW in the coastal areas of Sindh and Balochistan. Earlier, a Turkish firm Zorlu had offered to set up a 50MW wind power station and after receiving financing from the Asian Development Bank, it was enhanced to 300MW. The Chinese electricity giant, China Three Gorges Project Corporation, is also working on a project to generate 300MW of wind power in the country. It has already applied for tariff to set up a 50MW wind power farm in Jhimpir, Sindh.
The government, the source said, had decided to expedite investment in the wind power sector as it was the only segment in the power sector where huge foreign investment could be attracted in the short term. New projects could be set up in months as compared to expensive thermal and hydel power projects, which required years to complete. The investors are demanding the government notify upfront tariff for wind projects that would enable them to expedite their investments in the projects.
The source said that the water and power minister would be meeting the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) chairman on Tuesday to decide the upfront tariff issue. He said the Alternate Energy Development Board (AEDB) was working on the upfront tariff that NEPRA had assured would be implemented.
great news
hope ths hapens soon and as planed 🙂
What is the cost per unit of this energy? Will someone tell the cost of energy of coal,solor etc and of course hydra especially coming from Kalabagh [if].The issue is you can have cheaper energy solution but billion dollars commission has been the only obstruction which came from IPPS,Rental units,import of oil based energy. The poor have been plundered high and dry eby enemies of Kalabagh Dam since 1988 -PPP0-MQM,ANP etc because Pakistan could had been one of the biggest economies of world and yet we elect our enemies blindly.
COMMISSIONS,COMMISSIONS AND COMMISSIONS —NO TRUST IN GOVERNMENT
I TOTALLY AGREE WITH U SADIK BUTT
Fixed costs to install wind energy generation equipment are huge but once done the variable costs to produce energy are low. After energy production all the cost which required is of repair and maintenance on the plants. So the project sounds good! There are wind corridors in Sindh and Balochistan. Sindh wind corridor is said to have untapped potential of about 100,000 MW and that of Balochistan is humungous, 500,000 MW. Planning is all what we need and Zardari is what we don't need!
Norwegians are best people in the world to deal with,they have no political agenda… but a strong commitment to development , particularly to protecting the global environment ,
Pakistan Government needs to get its act together and expedite the implementation of the project and please don;t ask for any commision as you will not get any …..not from the Norwegians who have great values that they are proud of …
tmehmud
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