Anisul Islam Noor :
Bangladesh is going through costly electricity import from the neighbouring India at a time when its half of the generation capacity remained idle.
Energy experts however criticized the government for pursuing such a policy terming it ‘unwise’ saying that it is not only causing harm to the national exchequer but also leading the country towards an uncertainty over its long-term energy security.
In December (2015) Power Development Board (PDB) increased generation capacity to 12071MW. The power consumption of the country now stood at 4792MW while it increased 6775MW in the evening peak hours.
In the last one year from December 15, 2014 to December 15, 2015, the country’s power generation capacity has increased by 1,229 MW. Despite huge generation capacity at home, PDB has finlised Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Tripura on Saturday at Tk 6.44 per unit.
Adding the transmission charge, the import price will stand at Tk 6.71 per unit. Each unit, therefore, is Tk 1 more than the country’s average cost of electricity that is mean a serious disparity power sector, said Professor Anu Muhammad.
The dependency on power generation of private sector crossed the public sector as the government stopped the modernization of old power plants and delaying implementation of based load power plants as per master plan. These barriers create opportunity of making money by group of people from the power sector which has been paying by general people, he said.
As a result, there is no official load-shedding or power shortage across the country right now. The official statistics shows that the shortage in gas supply still has been the biggest barrier in power generation for which the government has to keep shut many of its generation units, for which about 872 MW power is not being generated.
Professor Shamsul Alam, Energy Expert of Consumers Association of Bangladesh (CAB) said, due to lack of accountability and indiscipline in power sector the nation has to pay high for electricity.
Some people had make money through illegal ways although their power plants sat idle for long time, he said.
Last year, the amount of non generation was 837 MW. At present, the government has put a good number of generation units under maintenance, the total capacity of which is 2,264 MW against 1,865 MW last year.
The statistics shows that the electricity demand in Dhaka area rose to 2,400 MW on December 15 this year from 2,076 MW during the same period last year while demand in Chittagong increased to 705MW from 610MW. The demand in Khulna rose to 770MW from 695MW, while that in Rajshahi to 664 MW from 593 MW, and that in Comilla to 536 MW from 497.
“Electricity generated from gas is usually cheaper than other generation sources such as coal and liquid fuel. But the government kept shut PDB running gas power plants saying that those are too old,” Professor Anu Muhammad said,
“Modern technology and machineries can be reset in those power plantsfor increase efficiency in power generation, But the government did not do it,” he said.
Professor Mustafijur Rahman of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) said, it is must to draw attention of local and foreign investors to make electricity in affordable price.
To achieve export volume USD $50 billion by 2017, the government should ensure uninterrupted electricity in reasonable price to the industries of the country, he further said.
State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid said, the power distribution grid was not developed in line with power generation capacity of the country, resulting full capacity utilized.
The government has taken initiatives to increase power grid capacity and set up sub required stations to give electricity in more houses and industries, the minister said.
