Chairman WAPDA Lt General Muzammil Hussain (retd), while speaking at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry in early March has said that first-ever National Water Policy would be launched soon which would help overcome water challenges. He said the energy and food security is as essential as security of borders. The country is preserving only 10 percent of flowing water despite the fact that water resources are depleting. Pakistan stands at 15th in the list of water deprived countries, he said.
The economic worth of water being wasted to sea is around $ 14.5 billion. He said we have to plan today for our future as population of Pakistan will cross the mark of 300 million by 2050. He said the government is working on various water and power projects.
LCCI President Malik Tahir Javed said that high price of energy adversely affects the export competitiveness of country as it takes major share in the production cost. The business community will be much relieved if per unit price of electricity is brought down because that would make our products more competitive in international market. He said that unlike Pakistan, India took right steps at appropriate times by building a number of small and large size dams in the same period of time. Due to its inherent advantages, hydel power is the best bet for overcoming the energy shortage in Pakistan which ranged from 5000 MW to 7000 MW in the peak season in 2017 according to unofficial sources. A significant push should be made towards building medium and long-term hydel capacity in the country.
According to the World Energy Council, the total hydropower resource in Pakistan is estimated at about 50,000 MW. Most of the resources are located in the North of the country which offers sites for projects ranging from 100 MW to 7,000 MW. Smaller sites having the capacity of less than 50 MW are available throughout the country. In addition, canal system with total of 58,450 km watercourses, farm channels and field ditchers running another 160,000 km in length has a huge hydropower potential at numerous sites/locations on each site, ranging from 1 MW to more than 10 MW hydro plants can be installed.
He said since Diamer-Bhasha Dam which has a gross capacity of 8.1 million acre feet (MAF) and installed power capacity of 4,500 megawatt (MW) is not a part of CPEC, the government should strive hard to mobilize maximum local resources for the timely completion of this project, he said.
