LAHORE (Web Desk) – The much talked controversial project Nandipur Power Plant has once again stopped functioning due to some unknown ‘technical fault,’ local media reports said on Friday.
The Ministry of Water and Power is taking emergency measurements to identify the fault and restore the plant.
ARY news claimed while quoting unammed sources that one of the boilers at Nandipur has met some fault which resulted in shut down if the power plant.
The national power grid station is facing a shortage of 425 MW due to recent fault in the power plant.
Nandipur power plant is second most largest thermal power plant of country after Guddu which has a capacity to produce 747 MW electricity.
Nandipur Power Project came in limelight when the 425 MW project suddenly stopped working merely weeks after inauguration in July this year. The controversy resulted in sacking former project director, who was earlier conferred Sitra-e-Imtiaz for the project, and audit of the project from international organisations.
During the tenure of the previous governments, the project was delayed for about four years resulting surge in it cost from $329 million to $847 million.
However a report from the auditor general of Pakistan said that project was competed at cost of 58.416 billion rupees.
Sharing details of the audit report on the power project at a news conference in Islamabad on Wednesday, Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Asif said the report has by and large endorsed the government’s position on the cost, production capacity of the plant.
He said the report has rejected allegations that the project cost has risen to eighty four billion rupees. He said fifty one billion rupees have so far been spent on the power project.
Khawaja Asif said Nandipur power project since its inauguration last year has produced electricity worth five point six billion rupees.
He said the new team revived the project and it is now fully functional and producing 445 megawatt of electricity.
The Minister said the auditor general in his report also recommended shifting of the power plant to the LNG. The Sui Northern Gas Pipelines will lay down the pipeline for the purpose which will help generate cheap and clean energy. This will also enhance the capacity of the power plant to five hundred megawatt.
Khawaja Asif said Nandipur power project suffered delay in the PPP government, but the present government resumed work on the project in 2013 as per the PC-1 approved by the previous government.
