ENERGY

  • Ban use of A/C’s in all Government offices
  • Develop wind and solar power
  •  Preference to small dams
  • Expert review of feasibility of large dams such as Kalabagh
  • Build ‘mini hydro’s – small turbines on streams and rivers
  • Develop ‘clean burn’ coal technology
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  • Support research in nuclear power generation. Energy is the life blood of an economy. The challenge is to generate and distribute energy in a cost effective, clean and sustainable way. Mustaqbil’s energy policy has two themes: Conservation and Generation.

Mustaqbil’s energy policy has two themes: Conservation and Generation. Conservation
Conservation is critical because it can yield some immediate short term benefits. These are the conservation measures that a Mustaqbil led government will take:

  • Ban the use of air conditioning in all government and semi government offices (central and provincial), regardless of whether these offices are equipped with air conditioners or not. This is a luxury Pakistan cannot afford at present. The ban will result in immediately freeing up generating capacity and allow a reduction in load shedding. And, in any case, it is unconscionable that those who are supposed to serve the public sit in closed, cooled offices while the vast majority of our public may not even have access to basic services
  • Consult with architects and their associations to develop guidelines and building codes that enhance the role of natural ventilation, and encourage the use of insulating materials. The object is to obviate the need for artificial cooling.
  • Consult with industry associations and energy consultants to optimize energy usage in factories. Combine this with tax breaks and other incentives to those who demonstrate energy savings.

GENERATION

Mustaqbil’s approach in setting generating policy will seek to minimize the environmental impact of power generation. Our objective will hence be to promote renewable sources of energy wherever possible. However, existing technology will not permit us to rely entirely on renewable sources. So, it is inevitable that we will have to continue to rely on conventional methods.

RENEWABLE

Renewable include: wind, solar, tidal, and geothermal sources of energy. Some people would include hydro power in this category but we will treat this as a special case.

WIND

Wind turbines now in use are efficient and cost effective and are widely used in the developed world. In Spain, for example, on a good (i.e. windy) day, wind power contributes more than 10% of all power supplied to the Spanish grid.
The problem here in Pakistan is that we have failed to encourage or develop the technology and subsequent ability to indigenously design and manufacture wind turbines. This means that any scheme to generate power from wind in Pakistan would have to rely on imported turbines.

This is unacceptable to Mustaqbil. We will insist that all wind turbines used in Pakistan are manufactured here. This could be done through technology transfer or through indigenous R&D. We are inclined towards the latter option since the technologies involved are basic and well understood.

Solar

Pakistan, as a tropical country, enjoys plentiful sunshine all year round. This blessing must be exploited. Mustaqbil’s solar strategy has two prongs to it:

  • Direct conversion to electricity by the use of photo voltaic solar cells.
  • Heat capture through absorptive materials, or at the focus of concave reflecting surfaces.

DIRECT CONVERSION first: The cost and efficiency of conventional silicon based photo voltaic cells makes this method expensive and largely impractical for large scale use in a country like Pakistan.
However, Mustaqbil plans to fund basic research at our universities with the objective of developing new photo electric materials which are efficient and can be produced at a low cost.

HEAT CAPTURE, on the other hand, is something that can yield immediate results. Applications can include water heaters and stoves in remote rural areas. Mustaqbil will seek a partnership between government, industry and academia to make functional solar devices available to the rural population.

TIDAL AND GEOTHERMAL

These are still largely experimental technologies whose practicality has not yet been demonstrated. Mustaqbil will review them in the context of specific geographic or regional features peculiar to Pakistan which may make either or both of them feasible.

HYDRO

Pakistan is a country of rivers. The combined potential hydro power generation capacity of the country is estimated to be in the range of 50 to 100 Gigawatts (GW). The dams currently in operation have a capacity that does not exceed 10 GW. So there is a lot of potential to augment hydro power generation in the country. Mustaqbil Pakistan is committed to building as many large dams in the country as financial resources permit. This includes building the Kalabagh Dam on a fast track schedule. It is a shame that this rich potential resource has fallen victim to political skullduggery.

We are also in favour of moving forward in an aggressive manner to build small scale hydroelectric projects. Such projects would be designed to be ‘slotted in’ to fast moving river flows in rural areas and provide power to one or several villages. The equipment could be just a single shore mounted turbine attached to a generator.

The challenge is to design and build these turbines and generators locally at a reasonable cost. And then to identify locations along the entire length of all our river systems to see where such ‘mini hydros’ could be slotted in.

Mustaqbil Pakistan will focus the nation’s resources to develop the technology to build and deploy the equipment needed for these ‘mini hydro’ projects.

CONVENTIONAL

We have defined ‘conventional’ power plants to mean plants in which power is generated either by gas or steam turbines. Gas turbine plants tend to be limited in the sort of fuels they can burn. This is because the fuel – gas or liquid – has to be burned in the turbine itself. Whereas in steam turbine plants the fuel is burned externally to produce steam which then powers a turbine. So steam turbine plants can operate on solid fuels such as coal. This means increased flexibility and generally lower costs.

Pakistan is poor in petroleum resources hence gas turbine powered plants would have to rely primarily on imported fuels. Whereas steam turbine plants could be operated from local resources such as coal.
Hence Mustaqbil believes that the preferred option for Pakistan is steam turbine plants. We also strongly believe that the technology to manufacture such plants should be developed locally.
It is worth stating that conventional power plants are large sources of atmospheric pollution. Mustaqbil will encourage the development and use of clean burning technologies that would seek to improve combustion efficiency and minimize the environmental footprint of such plants.

NUCLEAR

Nuclear power generation is a special case of a steam turbine plant. The steam in this case is generated by heat produced in a nuclear reactor. While power produced by nuclear plants is ‘clean’, the danger lies in the disposal of radioactive waste produced by the reactor. Such waste is highly radioactive and can remain so for tens of thousands of years. The challenge is to store it in a manner that keeps it ‘insulated’ from the environment for this long period of time. Mustaqbil believes that, while dangerous, nuclear power cannot be ignored as a potential source of long term power. We will hence continue to fund research and development in this area.