Federation and provinces: Energy sector suffers coordination gap due to 18th Amendment

LAHORE: The energy sector of Pakistan is suffering coordination gap among federation and provinces due to the 18th Amendment. According to the power sector experts, the growth of the electrical power sector in the country is hampered due to devolution of the energy sector by 18th amendment to province level.

Engineer Muhammad Khalid said lack of centralized efforts for the growth of the power sector in order to recruit renewable energy resources, evacuate grid capacity, control of funds and to develop institutional capacity at the provincial level are the prime factors of the prevailing situation.

Also, he said, inter-provincial conflicts on water-sharing are destroying productive understandings among provinces to deal with the energy crisis. The development of new hydel power stations like Kalabagh dam in Pakistan could not be made possible due to these conflicts, he added.

The experts have further pointed out that a denial of the Indus Water Treaty of 1960 by India was resulting in a shortage of water in Pakistan for agriculture, drinking purpose and also for power generation.

Another expert Engineer Amjad Mumtaz said Pakistan was indulged in a water war with India since its inception. After the Indus Water Treaty in 1960, a sigh of relief was observed in Pakistan. But after the rise of nationalist rhetoric and anti-Pakistan slogans in India, it is denying to follow this treaty and build dams on western rivers; which were assigned as Pakistan's property in the treaty. India has also started to build dams on the western rivers and diverting water flows to Pakistan by stating reasons of his own needs.

Apart from India, he said, Afghanistan is also planning to build dams on the Kabul River, which will stop water inflows from Afghanistan to Pakistan. Currently, the Kabul River feeds the Warsak dam which has power generation capacity of 241MW which is likely to be raised up by WAPDA in the near future. The building of dams on the Kabul River by Afghanistan will contribute negatively to the power sector of Pakistan and reduce its capacity, he apprehended. The water disputes of Pakistan with India and Afghanistan is already fatal for sectors like agriculture and sustainable water supplies, he added.

He said the energy sector of Pakistan has been facing unstable political environment in which no solid, versatile and visionary policy was formulated for simultaneously up-gradation of power generation, transmission and distribution facilities according to rising energy demand due to increasing population and improving living-standards.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020