Month: January 2021

ISLAMABAD: The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) on Thursday constituted a three-member committee to probe into the major power breakdown that plunged the whole country into darkness last weekend. In a notification issued here on Thursday, Nepra said that the inquiry committee comprising two private sector experts would be required to submit a report to the regulator within 15 days (till Jan 29). The committee is led by Nepra’s Director General Nadir Ali Khoso and comprised of former manager of the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC) Manu Ram…

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HYDERABAD: Sindh Minis­ter for Energy Imtiaz Ahmed Sheikh has urged his federal counterpart Omar Ayub to ensure issuance of notification for five wind power projects, to be installed by independent power producers (IPPs) in the province, to encourage investors and promote clean power industry. The minister said in a letter to the federal minister on Thursday that tariffs of the five wind power projects in Sindh had not been notified yet in the Gazette of Pakistan. He said that a delegation of local and foreign investors had contacted Sindh’s department…

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ISLAMABAD: In a move towards reviving the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme, the government has decided in principle to increase the electricity rates by about Rs1.90 per unit in the current billing month. A formal announcement to this effect is expected to be made over the next couple of days. A federal minister told Dawn that a news conference had been called to explain the rationale behind the tariff increase but was called off at the last minute on the instructions of the Prime Minister Office. The government had called the news…

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Pakistan generates close to 50 million tonnes of solid waste per year, almost 135,000 tonnes per day. Out of this, Karachi alone produces 10% or 13,500 tonnes of solid waste per day. Most Pakistanis, and especially Karachiites, suffer from a lack of solid waste collection, where it is scattered throughout the city. But the sad reality is, even if this waste was collected, landfills are full to capacity and do not have space to store this extra waste. Picking up waste and dumping it far away out of our sight…

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The Senate Standing Committee on Interior was informed that 12 top oil importers had been responsible for creating artificial oil shortage in the country. The panel, which met under the chairmanship of Rehman Malik, at the Parliament House on Thursday, was told that the FIA had identified those involved in the malpractice. The committee was given a detailed briefing by the petroleum secretary and FIA additional director general with reference to the failure of the concerned departments to control corruption and hoarding by the oil marketing companies (OMCs), which had caused…

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