Wednesday, July 8, 2020

Massive potential of green energy in Pakistan


By Masood Sattar Khan
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The green energy including hydropower potential in Pakistan is about 100 GW, but the explored potential was 56,770MW. By the end of 2019, China had participated in 24 hydropower projects in Pakistan, with an installed capacity of about 12,282 MW.

Among them, there are 9 projects under construction with an installed capacity of 6680 MW, 15 projects have been built, with an installed capacity of 5602 MW. 

These details were revealed on July 6 by the China Renewable Energy Engineering Institute (CREEI) in its report on the development of China’s foreign cooperation on renewable energy sector in 2019. 

The cooperation on renewable energy sector, such as hydropower, wind power and photovoltaic power, between China and international community has been enhanced in recent years. 

China has established 58 bilateral cooperation projects and participated in 33 multilateral cooperation projects with other countries including Pakistan. 

The report mentioned that Pakistan had timely adjusted its renewable energy development goals and policies in 2019, according to national development requirements and the latest demand. 

“Pakistan is rich in clean energy resources and has great potential for development. Thanks to CPEC, China and Pakistan have deepened cooperation in this field.” 

According to the report, hydroelectric power is still the most important resource of renewable energy.

The 64 countries along BRI have become the most popular areas for hydropower investment, such as Pakistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan. Those countries, with rich hydropower resources and low degree of exploitation, have huge potentials to develop hydropower.

China has established cooperation on hydropower with several countries including Pakistan. Ranked by the scale of projects, among the top 20 countries with China participating in hydropower cooperation, Myanmar has 39 projects with a scale of 20,858 MW while Pakistan has 24 cooperation projects with a scale of 12,282 MW.

Regarding wind power, by 2030, there will be a triple increase of onshore wind and tenfold increase of offshore wind around the globe while a large-scale electrification will be achieved.

China accounted for seven of the world's top 10 wind power developers by installed capacity in 2019, and all the top four. The scale of China's foreign cooperation on wind power has reached 6424 MW, mainly in onshore wind power and in Asia-Pacific region.

Besides Australia and Argentina, Pakistan is another important partner who has deeply cooperated with China on wind power sector. According to the report, Pakistan is rich in wind energy resources, with high annual average wind speed, exceeding 7 m/s, stable wind direction and good wind energy quality. If it can be developed and utilized, it can meet 5-10% of Pakistan's electricity demand.

This report also analyzed the development of photovoltaic power, biomass energy, geothermal energy, photo-thermal power, and other renewable energy. China’s cooperation with Russia, Britain, Pakistan, Switzerland and seven other countries has further deepened in 2019.

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