PESHAWAR:Pakhtunkhwa Energy Development Organization (PEDO) earned over Rs32 billion per annum for the province, said Secretary Energy and Power, Syed Zulfiqar Ali Shah on Tuesday.
He was presiding over a high-level meeting after assuming charge as Secretary of Energy & Power here.
PEDO Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Engr Naeem Khan gave him a detailed briefing and said currently, work underway on 42 energy projects including hydro and solar.
He was further told that PEDO has successfully completed 7 hydropower projects, which generate 161 MW of electricity and earn an income of Rs.4 billion per annum for the province.
Similarly, work on 12 projects, including 300 MW Balakot Mansehra, 157 MW Madyen Swat, 88 MW Gabral Kalam, 84 MW Matiltan Swat, 69 MW Lawi. (Chitral), 40.8MW Koto (Dir), 11.8 MW Karora (Shangla), 10.5 MW Chapri Charkhel (District Kuram) and 6.9 MW Mujahideen HPP Torghar were in progress.
On completion, these projects would generate a total of 778 MW of electricity and earn an annual income of more than Rs. 45 billion for the province.
The PEDO CEO said that most of these projects were in the final stages of completion.
Likewise, the projects of transferring 4,400 mosques, 8,000 schools, and187 basic health units to solar energy have also been successfully completed, saving millions of rupees annually to the province in terms of electricity bills.
In addition, 316 mini micro hydel stations have also been constructed in 12 far-flung districts lacking access to electricity. These mini-micro hydel stations were generating a total of 29MW electricity.
Electricity generated by these projects is being provided to the local community, while in the second phase, 291 mini micro hydel stations would be constructed to generate 47MW cheap electricity.
Furthermore, donor agencies, including the World Bank and Asian Development Bank were also working on several energy projects through private investment. In the next 10 years, the goal of generating 1,000 megawatts of cheap electricity has been set.
Apart from this, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Transmission and Grid Company (KPT&GC) has been established for the first time to improve the electricity system in the province and to enable the delivery of its own electricity.
A number of power projects have also been successfully completed in the merged tribal districts of the province, which has improved the power transmission system there to a maximum extent.
At the end of the briefing, the Secretary of Energy expressed his satisfaction with the overall performance of PEDO and said that the problems faced by the Federation in some energy projects would be resolved on a top priority basis at high-level forums.