KARACHI: The Sindh government has held out the firm assurance that it could do its best to resolve, in the shortest possible time, the key issues of investors doing wind energy projects in the province to prove that Pakistan is fully capable of utilising its massive potential to generate clean electricity through renewable energy means.
The assurance to this effect came from the Sindh Government Additional Chief Secretary of Dr Tanveer A Qureshi who is currently heading the provincial Energy Department as he spoke at a consultative session attended by managers and investors of wind energy projects in the province.
The Energy Update organised the session as a brainstorming session for its upcoming event i.e. Third International Wind Energy Summit that will be held in Karachi on October 4, 2018.
The consultative session was organised at a time when production from 20 operational wind power projects in Sindh has gone up to 1037 Megawatts while by November 2018 another 200 MW of clean energy would be added to the national grid through completion of four more wind energy plants. Some 35 wind projects are in different stages of development in the province that could generate up to 2500 MWs of more clean electricity.
One of the key problems being faced by the prospective investors keen to launch new wind energy projects in Sindh is the pending issue of leasing of the land in the Gharo-Jhimpir wind corridor of the province as the provincial government has the fullest resolve to solve the lease issue as early as possible in the best interest of the concerned investors.
In this regard, the Board of Revenue of Sindh Government is soon going to convene a top-level meeting to resolve the land lease issue of prospective investors of wind energy projects as the session would consider this issue as per directives of the apex judiciary.
Sindh additional chief secretary for Energy while speaking on the occasion acknowledged that previously the government could not give equal emphasis on all the facets of the energy sector as issues of the energy sector investors including those willing to do alternative power projects lingered on.
