The government is not considering to hike the electricity price right now, officials of power division said. Usually, when the price of gas is hiked, the people apprehend that the price of electricity will also be increased as over fifty percent of the country’s power plants are run by gas. But this time, the government doesn’t have any plan to hike the gas price, said officials.
Mentionable, from July 1, Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) increased gas price by 32.8 percent on an average for all users. When contacted Rahman Murshed, a member of BERC, he said that there is no link between the price hike of gas and electricity. “However, if the power generation, distribution and transmission companies propose to increase the price of electricity, only then will we consider the issue of raising the price,” he told Bangladesh Post.
When Ashuganj Power Station Company Limited Managing Director Engineer AMM Sazzadur Rahman was asked regarding this he told Bangladesh Post, “The gas price hike would have no impact on power generation now. However Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) knows about the matter.” BPDB chairmen Khaled Mahmood is out of country now, that’s why Bangladesh Post could not get his comment in this regard.
Currently, the country’s power generation capacity is 22,051MW. Of these, 16751MW power is being generated by BPDB, 1160MW is coming from import and the rest is generated by captive power plant (Privately owned power plants) and solar system. However, the latest numbers on the highest power generation was 12,893MW on May 29.
According to BPDB, at present, there are five types of fuel being used to generate electricity. The percentage ratio is coal-2.48% (444MW), gas-52.52 (9406MW), HFO (Heavy furnace oil)-25.07% (4490MW), HSD (High speed diesel)-12.18% (2118MW) and hydro-1.28% (230MW). It takes Tk 25 to generate per unit power by diesel, Tk 17 by furnace oil, Tk 8.1 by imported coal, Tk 1 by hydro and the generation cost for gas-based power plant is around Tk 2.57.
An official said around 1,376mmcf gas is being supplied for grid-connected power generation. It was 1,100mmcf before LNG supplying started. Earlier, some power plants used to be shut down for a long time due to gas crises and its cumulative capacity is around 2500MW.If BPDB gets more 500mmcfd gas, then it would be possible to continue generation of all gas-based power plants, generating around 2500MW of electricity. However, around 300mmcfd more gas will be supplied after overcoming the limitation of LNG pipeline.
“The government has taken an initiative to reduce dependency on diesel and furnace oil-based power plants. After LNG supply started, the electricity generation of gas-based power plants has increased. It is expected that countries first mega power plant, the coal-based Payra Power Plant, with a capacity of 1320MW will go into operation by this year. So, power generation cost will gradually decrease significantly,” official said.