Until the Karot Hydropower Project (KHPP) reaches commercial operation date (COD), the project will provide free electricity worth Rs3.9 billion to the national grid, said Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif during his visit to KHPP, according to Gwadar Pro.
The prime minister thanked the chairman of the China Three Gorges Corporation for the generous offer which will save around Rs4 billion for Pakistan’s national treasury.
“Free electricity until COD achievement, is something unprecedented in Pakistan’s history,” Shahbaz Sharif said.
According to the prime minister, if this is compared with coal-generated or furnace oil-generated power, then the amount is almost Rs9 billion.
“This is the true spirit of Pakistan-China friendship, which is higher than the Himalayas, sweeter than honey, and deeper than the Arabian Sea; we are iron brothers,” he said.
“It is great work done by CTG, which is part of CPEC; I have no doubt in my mind that there will be many more such hydropower projects, we will build through joint cooperation and this friendship between China and Pakistan,” said Shehbaz Sharif and added that such projects will make Pakistan a progressive and prosperous society in time to come. “I thank the Chinese team and WAPDA officials for this wonderful work,” he said.
KHPP is a run-of-river concrete-core rockfill gravity dam in Pakistan with an installed capacity of 720 MW. KHPP is the first investment project of the Silk Road Fund and is also part of CPEC. The project is being developed by Karot Power Company comprising Three Gorges South Asia Investment Limited, a subsidiary of China Three Gorges Corporation, China-CTGC, and Associated Technologies of Pakistan. It is the first hydropower project financed by China’s Silk Road Project.
