United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Mission Director to Pakistan, Greg Gottlieb, provided the power distribution companies PESCO and IESCO with tools and maintenance vehicles at a ceremony at Rawal Grid Station in Islamabad. The event began the start of the second stage of Live Line Maintenance training for crews from power distribution companies throughout Pakistan. USAID’s Energy Policy Program (EPP) is facilitating the training, tools, and vehicles to enhance the capacity of PESCO and IESCO to work on live power lines.
This is an effort in line with U.S. Government’s pledge to aid the Government of Pakistan in transforming the energy sector. The training and equipment provided will help provide Pakistan’s power distribution companies with the necessary resources needed to perform tests and maintenance on live power lines without shutting them down. This will pave way for a better energy availability and reliability.
Jim Hicks, Chief of Party of EPP, representatives of the Ministry of Water and Power, the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC), and CEOs of several power distribution companies joined Mission Director Gottlieb at the event. Gottlieb said, “Through efforts like this, undertaken in partnership with the Government of Pakistan, USAID is helping to increase the reliability of power transmission. These efforts are part of a broad U.S. government energy sector assistance program for Pakistan which is increasing access to reliable electricity for approximately 16 million people over a five year period.”
According to the U.S. government energy sector assistance program, USAID has financed renovations at Tarbela, Jamshoro, Mangla, Guddu, and Muzzafargharh power plants, supported the completion of Gomal Zam and Satpara dams, and helped in the development of power distribution throughout Pakistan. As a result of this, more than 1000 megawatts of power have been added to Pakistan’s power system. By the end of 2014, this hard work is expected to supply a cumulative total of 1400 megawatts to Pakistan’s power system.
