ISLAMABAD: Minister for Energy Hammad Azhar on Tuesday said those areas faced more load-shedding where recovery rate was low and complaints of power pilferage remained high.
Responding to a question in Senate, he said that K-Electric was provided with the subsidies at par with the ex-Wapda DISCO’s as the tariff was being maintained uniform across the board through the country.
He said that federal government was providing additional 550 MW to K-Electric to mitigate the suffering of residents of Karachi.
The minister said that tariff differential subsidy was offered to KE’s consumers and it was the difference between NEPRA, determined tariff and applicable and tariff which was normally set at a lower level in line with government’s social obligations.
He further said that there was strict check on substandard materials, as proper committee was constituted to visit each workshop for inspection of material. “Inadequacies or any irregularity observed were immediately reported to concerned S.E Operation circle, Regional Manager M&T PESCO.
He said that `Kunda culture’ was damaging the transmission line, adding that there were multiple challenges and efforts underway to further improve the overall transmission and distribution system, adding that government had allocated funds for the new fiscal year.
He said that losses were reduced and further improvement would come with the steps taken by the present government. He said that maximum electricity was provided to Karachi.
He said that he also met previous day with Ambassador of Iran and discussed various matters relating to the Energy Sector.
The Iranian ambassador informed the minister that Iranian side was ready to supply more electricity to Pakistan and necessary infrastructure had already been built by the country.
He informed that close coordination between the relevant organisations dealing with import of electricity was needed for early materialisation of the project.
Answering to a supplementary question, the minister said that there were 40, 000 tube-wells in Balochistan province which were not paying bills and the government was making efforts to convert all these tube-wells on solar.
