I would like to present a few ideas that can help with our energy crisis.

1. Replacing thermal power fuel:
Pakistan produces about 81 percent of its electricity through oil and gas which costs us about 9.4 billion dollars. To put it in other terms, that is about 53 percent of our total exports and is the biggest cost on our import bill. Now given that our reliance on thermal power is so large, we simply cannot dismantle it and magically move to hydro power, however we can change the fuel used to gain thermal power. Instead of using oil and gas, both of which are getting more expensive and have volatile international prices, we can move to using coal.

2. Moving past the myth of Thar coal :
Yes, there is coal in Thar, but assuming that it can be used immediately or it will solve all our energy problems is a myth propagated by a few people and political parties for their personal gains. Experts agree that Thar coal is highly unstable – making it difficult to transport it from one location to another – and even its gasification is not risk-free.

3. Improved energy mix:
Energy mix refers to the sources of energy we utilize in Pakistan to fulfil our overall energy needs. I need to give credit to the PML-N on this one as they are the first ones to talk of the holistic energy mix and not just the CNG or the electricity crisis.

4. Stand alone power projects:
This is a suggestion that I gave at the conference and I am advocating it now again. About 40 percent of Pakistan is off the national grid; that means they effectively get to no electricity.

5. Dismantle the national grid:

The national grid needs to be dismantled and provincialised, because under the 18th amendment, the profits of power generation go to the province that is producing the power, meaning if electricity is being produced at Tarbela, royalties of that are being paid to KP Government by all other provinces. However, they sell it to the national grid and then the national grid sells it down to the District Electrical Supply Companies who further sell the power to the consumers. This way, if there is a shortfall, national grid chooses the electricity supply patterns and hence decides which areas suffer outages the most.