Govt seeks special tariff for $2.1bln Matiari-Lahore transmission line

ISLAMABAD, March 10: The government has sought a special tariff for 878km Matiari-Lahore transmission line to be built by a Chinese firm at a cost of $2.1 billion to evacuate upcoming 4,950 megawatts of electricity from coal-based power plants at Thar, Hub and Port Qasim.
This is the first transmission line project in the private sector.
Interestingly, however, the tariff petition for laying the transmission line on a build, own, operate and transfer (BOOT) basis by the Chinese firm State Grid of China/China Electric Power Equipment and Technology Co Ltd (CET) has been filed by the Private Power and Infrastructure Board (PPIB) on behalf of the National Trans­mission and Despatch Company (NTDC), a state-owned entity registered under the company laws.
Based on engineering procurement and construction (EPC) cost of $1.76 billion and other cost build-ups total $2.1bn, the PPIB has requested National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) to approve a transmission tariff of 95 paisas (0.914 cents) per unit (kWh) for 30-year life of the transmission line. It will involve 80:20 per cent debt-equity ratio.
Informed sources said the NTDC which operates over 14,000km of transmission system of various capacities had previously applied for the tariff that was rejected by Nepra for technical and legal reasons.
The tariff petition has been prepared purely on the basis of “financial and technical data received from the CET. The project will be transferred to NTDC on completion of 25 years.
It said the NTDC and Chinese firms had signed cooperation agreement for two similar transmission lines. Apart from Lahore-Matiari, the other project included 660kv High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) transmission line from Port Qasim to Faisalabad with 4,000MW capacity but that is not part of this petition.-Agencies