Energy Minister inaugurates AMI project to reduce power losses

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Energy Khurram Dastgir has formally inaugurated the installation of Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) project in Islamabad.

Addressing the inaugural ceremony of the project, the minister said he said these modern electricity meters will be installed in all high-loss feeders to help resolve commercial losses of electricity.

The minister said he has issued instructions to the distribution companies for resolving energy-related issues on a priority basis.

He said the installation of advance meters in Islamabad is a trial run and the cost of this complete project is $170 million. The first phase of this project will cost $95 million.

He said the government has initially decided to enforce AMI metering in Rawalpindi Cantonment Circle and Rawalpindi City Circle.

He added that all kind of meters in these circles will be replaced. The minister expressed commitment to complete the project before the deadline in 2025.

Dastgir said the first bidding for 600 Megawatt solar energy project will be launched soon and it would be Pakistan’s first project of alternate cheap electricity. He said these all measures are testament to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s commitment to resolving the energy crisis. A

Earlier today while responding to questions at the floor of National Assembly, Minister for Power Khurram Dastgir said the AMI would be installed by end of the current fiscal year

He said that this system was being used in developed countries and it was yielding positives results both for the organization and consumers.

The minister said that it would also help control electricity theft being conducted through ‘Kunda System’ in many areas across the country.

The installation of this new metering system will bring a significant change in power division and also provide relief to the consumers in the shape of minimum load-shedding in their respective areas, he added.

He said that as per normal routine, load-shedding was being observed eight hours particularly in those areas where 60 to 70 percent of bills were not being recovered but approximately four to six hours load-shedding was being observed.

He further said that it was policy of the government that there should be short period of load-shedding in those areas where the ratio of losses was low.

Expressing reservation on this new metering system, MNA Ghullam Ali Talpur said that the Power Division had made a number of experiments since so far but it could not get desired results yet.

He said that before introducing the AMI system, the division concerned installed ABC cable networking across the country on which a huge national exchequer was sent but it was failed.

The minister seconded his apprehension and said that the cable networking project flopped due to certain reasons.

He expressed hope that through the AMI system, the picture would be clear that how much electricity was being used and how much was being theft against the feeder.

He said it would also improve the quality of billing mechanism as it would settle the issue of deduction bills imposed on the consumers unnecessarily and illegally in various areas of the country.

While complaining about the deduction bills, MNA Dr Darshan Lal proposed the minister to establish a ‘complaint cell’ at the Ministry level for timely redressal of the consumers’ grievances. He said that it was a persistent issue in Sindh and people had to pay extra bills against their consumed units.

The National Assembly was informed on that power generation capacity is sufficient in the country to meet the load demand.

In a written reply, the Power Division said government attaches the highest priority to avoid load shedding.

It said the government prioritized the utilization of local fuel-based plants to reduce power shortfall and is removing bottlenecks for imported fuel-based plants to maintain smooth supply chain.

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