Minister of State for Board of Investment Dr. Mifta Ismail met with the Ex-Chairman PEMRA Mushtaq Malik along with the CEO of a French Company ENGIE Mr. Raphael Colas to discuss the prospects of setting up solar projects/plants in Punjab today.
Minister of State said that government is planning to set up a 1000MW installed capacity of solar plants in Quaid e AzamSolarPark, 300MW has already been installed in that. Sind also has some similar plans regarding alternative energy. It was decided that wind will be taken from Sindh as it has abundance of it due to coastal area and solar power will be taken from Punjab. There are some issues like grid capacity and transmission line etc which will be addressed soon. Moreover he added that government is going to announce a policy on solar projects in a few days to clarify many things regarding it.
CEO of ENGIE Mr. Colas told that ENGIE is the second largest electricity producer company with 150k people working under them. They are already working in India, Turkey, Morroco, Egypt and Abu Dhabi etc. and they are very much willing to install solar plants in Punjab.
Next tariff for power generation are going to be cheaper as it has already been reduced from 13.5 to 10.2, said the State Minister. He said that there are many companies, national and international both, which are willing to invest in alternative energy especially in solar energy in Pakistan. He also asked Mr. Colas to meet Jahanzaib Khan (Additional Chief Secretary Punjab) who is heading the Solar Project in Punjab. Other technicalities and things related to power set up like tax holidays, land, and feasibility were also discussed in the meeting. State Minister said that those companies would obviously be given preference which already have LOI (Letter of Intent), land, and have done feasibility etc.
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