Sindh’s power regulatory authority to become functional next month, says Nasir

The proposed Sindh Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Sepra) will likely become functional by the end of the next month. The authority will initiate the process for reducing power prices for domestic and industrial consumers in the province by assuming control of tariff determination process.

Sindh Energy Minister Syed Nasir Hussain Shah stated this on Monday while speaking as the chief guest at a consultative workshop titled ‘Solar Wind Hybrid Project B2B Arrangements’ jointly organised by the Sindh energy department and Energy Update.

The energy minister expressed the hope that the federal government would fully support Sepra so that it became functional and provided due economic relief to the consumers by reducing power tariffs.

He said the solar parks being established under the public-private partnership and the renewable electricity being supplied through the Sindh Transmission and Dispatch Company (STDC) were two key pillars of the plan of the Sindh government being executed to reduce the consumer-end tariff.

He explained that the solar parks were being built in Sindh to deliver on the poll manifesto promise of the Pakistan Peoples Party of providing 300 units of free electricity to the destitute consumers.

He told the audience at the workshop that the Sindh government would soon start distribution of 200,000 solar home systems to off-grid homes under a World Bank-assisted drive to promote clean energy use in the province.

Shah said the Sindh government had been working hard to ensure early implementation of the plan contained in the new provincial budget to provide 500,000 solar panels to off-grid homes in faraway areas.

He informed the audience that the capacity payments to independent power producers would remain fully controlled under the incoming proposed SEPRA regime in Sindh to ensure consumer tariffs did not unduly increase.

The provincial government had the utmost resolve to energise as soon as possible 2.6 million off-grid homes using the massive renewable power production potential of the province, Shah remarked.

He said the federal authorities would most likely fully assist Sindh in implementing these energy plans envisioned in line with the 18th Constitutional Amendment. Sindh Alternative Energy Director Mehfooz Qazi told the audience that the provincial government had initially planned to set up solar-wind hybrid generation plants of 350 MW generation capacity to produce electricity at a proposed tariff of Rs18.45 per unit.

He said the per-unit cost of electricity would be reduced with expansion in the generation capacity of the hybrid power plants. He said the hybrid renewable energy project would be capable of producing 766 GW of clean energy per year.

He said the Sindh government would conduct third-party studies and validation to firm up its hybrid clean power generation plan that would massively benefit industries in the province. He said the transmission and distribution systems of the STDC would be fully utilised to evacuate clean electricity produced by hybrid wind-solar projects to industrial consumers in the province under the B2B arrangements.

Thar Coal Energy Board Managing Director Tariq Ali Shah shed light on the proposed electricity policy of Sindh while saying that the Constitution fully supported the provinces to establish their own power sector regulators and transmission and distribution companies as being done in Sindh.

Naeem Qureshi of the Energy Update expressed the hope that the consultative workshop would be helpful in harnessing the massive clean energy potential of Sindh. Several concerned representatives of energy sector companies, academics and researchers attended the workshop and gave their views on the proposed B2B arrangement for the upcoming wind-solar hybrid power project under the public-private partnership mode. Sindh Energy Secretary Mussadiq Ahmed Khan, STDC CEO Saleem Shaikh, Engineer Irfan Ahmed and other senior officials of the energy department also attended the workshop.