As citizens across the country suffer from frequent gas outages, another spell of electricty load shedding is awaiting the consumers from December 26, when canals will be closed for desilting and hydroelectric power generation will drop sharply, sources told Pakistan Today on Tuesday.
The Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO) has asked the Finance Ministry to release at least Rs 20 billion in additional funds to meet the power demand, but so far has not received any positive response from the ministry.
Sources said that because of the closure of the canals, hydroelectric generation would drop by at least 2,500 megawatts to 3,000 megawatts and it would result in minimum six to eight hours of load shedding every day. The canals would remain closed for one month and it is expected that the water flow in the rivers would return to normal levels in the first week of February. Load shedding began again from Sunday, December 18. The current duration of load shedding is only three to four hours but it is projected to increase sharply once the canals are closed, reaching up to eight hours.
These days, PEPCO is getting around 4,000MW from hydroelectric generation, around 1,600MW from thermal and more than 5,600MW from Independent Power Producers (IPPs).
The demand of electricity in Pakistan during winter touches 12,000MW and if 3,000MW of power is subtracted from the system, the shortfall would be at least 30 percent and it would be managed through six to eight hours of load shedding, said the sources.
They said power plants running on gas could also face problems because of gas shortfall, with PEPCO also facing gas curtailment for its power plants. “Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) is also facing gas shortfall and it is expected that gas for power plants would drop and around 1,000MW shortfall would be added,” said a senior official of the Water and Power Ministry, adding that if gas supply was reduced the duration of load shedding could touch 10 hours.
PEPCO Managing Director Rasool Khan Mahsud told Pakistan Today that he was making every effort to control load shedding caused by the canal closures. “I am hopeful that there will be very little load shedding during the canal closures, as we have requested the Ministry of Finance to release additional money,” he said, adding that in recent months PEPCO made round the clock efforts to provide electricity to consumers. However, he did not deny that there would be increased load shedding during canal closures.
