Kathmandu, August 17 : Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Barsha Man Pun has said that the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) is ready to rise above new challenges with courage and determination. At a programme organised today to mark the 35th anniversary of NEA, Minister Pun, who is also the chairman of NEA Board of Directors, said so.
Reliable power supply to the consumers and electrification of 100 per cent households, becoming self-reliant in electricity, increasing the level of domestic power consumption and exporting power in the external markets are the challenging jobs ahead, the Minister added.
He also shared that Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) would be done with the power developers from the private sector and a proper environment would be created for the sale of electricity. Stating that the government will develop only reservoir-based and semi-reservoir-based mega hydropower projects, Minister Pun added that the government has advanced Upper Arun (1061 MW) and Dudh Koshi Project (600 MW).
Also speaking at the programme, National Planning Commission Member Krishna Prasad Oli, Chairman of Electricity Regulation Commssion Dilli Bahadur Singh and Energy Secretary Dinesh Kumar Ghimire lauded the progress of the NEA made in the recent time and called for institutional development of NEA, automation of system upgrade and management of the surplus power in the near future.
Similarly, Managing Director of NEA Kulman Ghising admitted that some under-construction projects could not be completed in time due to certain reasons despite sincere efforts, which could shadow the good performance of the NEA. He shared that charging station would be built and lift irrigation would be promoted and cooking gas would be replaced with electric oven to increase power consumption in the domestic market. As shared on the occasion, the NEA made Rs 11.06 billion in profit in the fiscal year 2076/77 BS, which has made the NEA’s economic health sound bringing the company’s total profit to Rs 4.87 billion. In 2072/73 BS, the NEA had the total loss of Rs 34.61 billion. Of the public enterprises in the country, NEA is the highest profit-making public enterprise for the past two consecutive years.
Likewise, the NEA has made a whopping progress in controlling electricity leakage. The electricity leakage in system is 15.27 per cent now, which was 25.78 per cent in 2072/73 BS. With the control of power leakage by almost 11 per cent in four years, the NEA has saved about Rs 8 billion. Similarly, the import of power from India has reduced while the portion of Nepal’s export to India has increased in the recent time. Till the last fiscal year, Nepal imported 22 per cent of total available power and it would be reduced in between 5 to 10 per cent in the current fiscal year, according to Managing Director Ghising. He said that Nepal would be fully reliant in power from 2078/79 and net export shall begin then. Ghising was of the view that Nepalis’ per person power consumption has increased gradually.
In the fiscal year 2073/74, the total annual electricity consumption was recorded 4.77 billion units plus while the consumption reached almost 6.53 billion units in the last fiscal year. Currently, per person annual power consumption in Nepal is around 245 units. RSS
