ISLAMABAD: The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) on Thursday scrutinised a petition from the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) seeking an over 80 per cent increase in its bulk generation tariff.
At the hearing, chaired by Nepra’s KP member Maqsood Anwar Khan, Wapda officials said their base revenue requirement for FY26 stood at Rs179 billion, compared to Rs96.93bn approved in FY23, raising the base tariff from Rs3.10 to Rs5.67 per unit — up 83pc. However, pending claims from previous years lifted the FY26 revenue requirement to Rs318.5bn, while net hydel profit obligations further pushed it to Rs365bn for a projected generation of 31,563 gigawatt hours. This translates into a near-90pc hike in bulk hydropower rates to Rs11.55 per kilowatt hour from Rs6.10.
Nepra’s Sindh member Rafique Shaikh questioned Wapda’s failure to meet project-level generation targets, arguing that tariff hikes must be justified with tangible performance. Wapda countered that its contribution should be assessed in terms of national water security, flood management, and aggregate output, which remain subject to hydrological variations.
The petition also includes Rs99bn for debt servicing, Rs15bn for doubling employee salaries over three years, and substantial increases in O&M costs. Wapda further cited unresolved gaps of Rs139bn from FY23–25 and Rs46bn in hydel profits for KP, Punjab, and AJK.
Story by Khaleeq Kiani
