Accessing CPPs for ready power

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Of the many suggestions put forward in order to address the prevailing state of power crunch, one was about buying power from neighbouring countries. But it hit a snag when it could be known that they may not have surplus power to sell. On the contrary, hefty investments in transmission infrastructures and considerable time would be required to get such power through cross-border transmission. Renting of movable power plants was considered. Analysing and exploring all possible ways of getting ready power for the grid, it was found that the best prospect for getting ready power involved tapping the power generation potential of the captive power producers (CPPs). The CPPs are the industries in different sectors, which established their own power generation capacities over the years in the face of worsening power supply positions from the public sector.
The CPPs have reportedly a combined generation capacity of some 1,300 mw and much of it remains unutilized. They are, therefore, in a position to generate a good amount of power after meeting their own needs and feed the same to the national grid. No new investments in machines, equipment or land would be needed for this purpose. If government only provides them with the reasonable incentive price to sell this power to it or decides to help them decrease their power generation costs by providing subsidy to lower the price of gas to be used by the CPPs, then it should be easily possible to get as much as 500 mw from the CPPs within a month or two.
Why is the power ministry not doing everything possible to tap this source of ready power, is an enigma. All concerned need to urge the ministry concerned to immediately go for such option.
Murad Reza
Eskaton,
Dhaka