PEW terms new load management plan impractical
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The Pakistan Economy Watch (PEW) on Sunday said government’s new energy load management plan is flawed and unfeasible in the prevailing circumstances.
The recently announced electricity and gas load management plan which prefers textile sector over masses is highly faulty and largely suppositional, it said.
The decision shows a major policy shift which will please the influential textile sector but it may hardly work for a month only, said Dr. Murtaza Mughal, President PEW.
He said that the country’s malfunctioning energy system lacks capacity to exempt the Punjab’s textile industry from loadshedding without compromising other critical sectors.
The finance minister has ordered restoration of full gas supply to textile units in Punjab after a meeting with a delegation of the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (Aptma) conveniently ignoring other sectors benefiting millions of masses, he added.
Dr. Murtaza Mughal said that this was not the first time that a controversial gas distribution formula was ordered by the finance minister overstepping the domain of Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources…
Hardly a week ago, had the Petroleum Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi withdrawn 108 MMCFD gas from textile units and the primitive captive power plants (CPPS) due to increased domestic demand.
Dr. Mughal said that the CPPs can be run on furnace oil, diesel and coal but they prefer gas to maximise profits; adding that diversion of natural gas from the domestic to industrial sector will have political consequences as this has never done before.
The recent gas and electricity load management plan is another example of the competence of our economic team which will never go down well with masses and other sectors.
