Govt switching to on demand use of quick rental power
Bangladesh is shifting to “Uber-like on demand use” of the plants that were set up as a quick fix to power shortage
The government is switching to on-demand use of rental and quick rental power instead of paying capacity charge to contract-expired plants even if they sit idly on surplus electricity supply, said an adviser to the prime minister.
"We are moving towards an Uber-like model in running the plants in the future. If we use electricity from the plants during peak time or an emergency, the owners will get paid. Otherwise, they will not get the money," Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury, energy adviser to the prime minister, told a dialogue Tuesday.
At the programme titled "Rental-Quick Rental Power Plants: Past, Present and Future", he said it is true the rental power plants were set up for during an emergency, but the country is now better off than emergency.
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Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury said electricity demand is calculated considering the peak time.
"Now our demand is 12,000 to 13,000 megawatts. But in the next year, this demand will increase to 15,000 megawatts. We need to consider that some power plants remain shut for scheduled maintenance and fuel shortage though their capacity gets included to the official estimation," he added.
The Forum of Energy Reporters Bangladesh (FERB) and the Bangladesh Independent Power Producers Association (BIPPA) organised the dialogue jointly.
At the dialogue, Dr Mustafa K Mujeri, executive director of the Institute for Inclusive Finance and Development (InM), presented the keynote paper, underscoring the need to formulate a plan for the strategic use of the plants.
"One option could be to explore the costs and benefits of using the viable plants for a longer period instead of shutting them down after the expiry of the present contracts considering the significant establishment costs," he said.
"Secondly, the possibility of converting viable plants into gas-based plants could also be explored as liquid fuel entails high power generation cost in the long run," he added.
Dr Khondaker Golam Moazzem, research director at the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), said rental and quick rental provision in 2010 was "very rational and logical" due to the context of demand.
"But that situation and context do not exist now. So, there is no scope and reason for extending the contracts for quick rental and rental power plants anymore," he said.
"It is high time we went for a competitive model for taking on new projects in the power sector," he added.
The CPD research director said quick rental plants must retire to cut back on government expenditure, affordable electricity for consumers and to make the power development board profitable.
"As per the government's commitment to green energy, renewable energy needs a space. But if we repeatedly renew the rental and quick rental plants, renewable will not get that," he said.
Among other, Engineer Md Belayet Hossain, chairman of Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB); Imran Karim, president of BIPPA; Navidul Huq, vice president of BIPPA; Mohammed Hossain, director general of Power Cell and Md Mahbubur Rahman, member (company affairs) of BPDB, addressed the dialogue.
FERB Chairman Arun Karmaker chaired the programme while its Executive Director Md Shamim Jahangir moderated the event.
