- Decrease due to decline in coal, RLNG costs.
- Power generation totalled 18,526 MW in Sept.
- Data showshydel was leading source of power generation.
KARACHI: The cost of power generation in September has fallen over 25% year-on-year, owing to an increase in hydropower output and lower gas and coal prices, The News reported citing the latest data.
In the previous month, the average cost of power production wasRs7.42 per kilowatt-hour as compared to Rs9.91 a year ago, brokerage firm Arif Habib Ltd said in a report, citing National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) data.
“Cost of power generation decreased by 25.2% year-on-year during the month of September, however, it is still higher than the reference cost of Rs7.07/KWh,” said Tahir Abbas, the head of Research at AHL.
“On a year-on-year basis, the decrease in fuel cost is witnessed mainly due to a decline in coal and re-gasified liquid natural gas (RLNG) based cost of generation along with 14% year-on-year rise in hydel-based generation.”
The cost of power generation saw a decline of 10.3% on a monthly basis as compared to the average cost of Rs8.27 in August.
Meanwhile, power generation in the country totalled 13,339 GWh (18,526 MW) in September 2023, up 3.6% as compared to the same period last year. In September 2022, power generation stood at 12,878 GWh (17,886 MW), the data showed.
The year-on-year increase in power generation comes on the back of local coal-based sources, which reached 1,479 GWh during September 2023, up by 155.6% year-on-year.
Apart from local coal, the year-on-year increase was attributed to improved RLNG (16.8%), hydel (13.7%), and bagasse (2.9%). However, on a monthly basis, power generation decreased by 16.4%, as compared to 15,959 GWh registered in August.
During the first quarter of the current financial year, power generation also increased by 7.4% year-on-year to 44,138 GWh (19,990 MW) compared to 41,081 GWh (18,606 MW) during the same period of last year.
Data showed that hydel was the leading source of power generation, accounting for 37.6% of the generation mix, to become the largest source of electricity generation in the country in the month of September.
The hydel power generation was followed by nuclear, which accounted for 17.1% of the overall generation, followed by RLNG which accounted for 16% of the power generation share.
Among renewables, wind, solar and bagasse generation amounted to 3.1%, 0.6% and 0.3% of the generation. Local coal accounted for 11% and imported coal for 4% of the total power generation of the country.
Read More: Sept registers 25% reduction in power generation cost