Power Crisis to Ease Within 15 Days: State Minister for Power

State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Anindya Islam Amit has said the country’s power situation will improve within the next 15 days as the government works to address the ongoing power and energy crisis. Speaking in Parliament on Wednesday in response to a supplementary question from opposition lawmaker Md Nurul Islam of Chapainawabganj-3, the state minister apologised to the people for the severe load shedding and power crisis. Speaker Hafiz Uddin Ahmed Bir Bikram chaired the session.

Mr. Amit said the current crisis is the result of wrong policies over the past 15 years, inadequate investment in the power and energy sectors and the impact of the recent Middle East crisis. He said gas-based power plants in Bangladesh have a combined capacity of about 12,000 MW and require around 1,900 million cubic feet of gas daily to operate at full capacity. Currently, 2,300-2,700 million cubic feet of gas, including domestic production and imported LNG, is available. However, supplying all of it to power plants would disrupt gas supplies to industries and households. Therefore, gas must be distributed among the power, industrial and domestic sectors.

One 616 MW unit of the Payra Power Plant is currently shut due to a technical problem, while a 616 MW unit of the Matarbari Power Plant is under maintenance. The government is working to bring both units back into operation quickly. Regarding the power purchase agreement with Adani, Amit said Bangladesh is supposed to receive 1,600 MW, but currently gets about 900 MW during the day and around 1,100 MW in the evening.

He also said one of the country’s two floating storage and regasification units (FSRUs) for imported LNG developed a fault on July 21 and took 21-22 days to repair. This caused major disruption to the energy supply system and affected power generation. Around 88 percent of the supply system has now returned to normal, while full normalisation is expected by early next month.

To address the immediate crisis, the government has decided to increase generation from furnace oil-based power plants. Amit said these are peaking plants and cannot operate continuously at full capacity. They can generate a maximum of about 4,000 MW, compared with the 6,000-6,500 MW often reported. At present, around 3,200 MW is being generated from these plants.

The government owes around Tk 46,500 crore in arrears to furnace oil-based power plants from the previous government and the interim government. The Finance Ministry has recently allocated Tk 600 crore, which could help increase generation to about 4,000 MW. The state minister said the government is closely monitoring efforts to restore Payra and Matarbari to full capacity and urged people to use electricity economically. He also sought cooperation from lawmakers to enforce the directive to close shops and shopping malls by 8pm.

Mr. Amit identified rooftop solar as an important medium-term solution. The government plans to install solar panels on government and private buildings ahead of the next summer and irrigation season. Local entrepreneurs will invest in the projects and can sell surplus electricity to the government at Tk 10.50 per unit, while the estimated production cost is up to Tk 8 per unit.

He said those installing rooftop solar within the next six months could recover a significant portion of their investment by selling surplus electricity for up to three years. The government is also considering customs duty and VAT benefits for manufacturers and special incentives for solar panel importers.

Mr. Amit said the power and energy crisis was also caused by inadequate investment in transmission and distribution systems. Although many power plants were built, sufficient fuel supplies and necessary investments in transmission and distribution were not ensured, leaving some rural areas without electricity for long periods.