Parliament House: US embassy delegation visits 1MW solar power project

A delegation led by Assistant Commercial Attach'e of Cultural exchange, United states Embassy in Islamabad, in collaboration with the Pakistan-US Alumni Network (PUAN), and the United States Educational Foundation in Pakistan (USEFP) visited the Parliament House on Monday experiencing Solar Energy best practice in shape of 1 MW Solar Power Project of the Parliament house.
The US Mission in Pakistan in collaboration with the Pakistan-US Alumni Network (PUAN), and the United States Educational Foundation in Pakistan (USEFP) is organising an International conference Climate Change Conference "Changing Minds for Climate Change" from 11th to 14th November, 2016 in Islamabad.
This event has brought together approximately 250 professionals, key players and alumni of US government sponsored exchange program from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Tajikistan, China and Afghanistan. The purpose of their visit of the Parliament House was to introduce the participants from around the country who have not seen this sort of facilities at their country and region.
Shahid Shoukat, Project Manager, highlighted the core values of the vision of Speaker National Assembly, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq; sustainability, responsibility, communication, integrity and respect while starting his presentation. The introduction of the solar energy and journey to have been this best practice after conducting a complete energy audit of the Parliament House to implement the vision of Speaker National Assembly as he was concerned about excessive electricity consumption and excessive maintenance cost was also shared with the participants.
The audit quickly enabled to identified the substantial opportunities for energy saving and these efforts ultimately led to the Parliament House to have been independent Green project of 1 MW Solar Power project by acquiring the first net metering license in Pakistan.
Participants were also informed that solar project of Parliament House is environmentally friendly as it has contributed to reduce the emissions of hazardous gases (CO2, SO2, Dust and Carbon) drastically and solar energy prevents to get effected the environment by the pollutant produce by the other energy sources like fossils fuels.
He also shared the efforts of the Parliament house in taking this first step and emphasised on the important role of solar energy in resolving the energy crises in the countries/region by sharing the solar potential in the respective regions.
After detailed presentation, the participants also visited the site of Solar Energy project installed at parking area of Parliament House. A certificate was also presented by the US Embassy in Islamabad to the Parliament of the Parliament. This visit will help the participants to provide a space to discuss and debate key climate change issues as energy, environment management, environmental diplomacy, clean-tech innovation replication of this best practice, governance and policy issues.