Payment mechanism, pact with IPPs: CCoE approves Power Division’s summary

ISLAMABAD: The Cabinet Committee on Energy (CCoE) has approved a summary submitted by the Power Division on payment mechanism and agreement with Independent Power Producers (IPPs) with recommendations to send it to the ECC and the Cabinet for final approval.

The CCoE in its meeting also approved a report of the sub-committee constituted by the CCoE vide its decision dated 18.01.2021 regarding allocation of pipeline capacity to new LNG Terminals, with an aim to encourage investment and provide a level-playing field to the LNG terminals.

The CCoE met with Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Asad Umar in the chair in Islamabad on Monday.

The Power Division submitted the summary on payment mechanism and agreement with the IPPs.

The summary was based on the output of the implementation committee that was constituted to convert the memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with the IPPs into legally binding agreements.

The committee completed its task and agreed on a detailed implementation mechanism with all the IPPs.

The Power Division secretary briefed the CCoE on the salient features of the agreements and the other details.

He further briefed that the agreements would result in significant savings over the life of those projects, as envisioned in the MoUs.

The CCoE approved the summary with recommendations to send the summary to the ECC and the Cabinet for further approval.

The Power Division requested the CCoE approval for ratification of a mistake made in previous summaries submitted to the CCoE in its meetings held on 27th February 2019 and 28th August 2019, whereby three companies were erroneously included in two different categories at the same time.

The Committee took a serious view of the matter.

The ministry was asked to rectify the mistake immediately and extent full facilitation to the private investors.

The meeting was attended by Minister for Energy Omar Ayub Khan, Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Shibli Faraz, Federal Minister for Finance and Revenue Abdul Hafeez Sheikh, Abdul Razak Dawood, Adviser to the Prime Minister on Commerce and Investment, SAPM on Petroleum Nadeem Babar, and officials of the various divisions.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021