KATHMANDU: The World Bank (WB) study has revealed that Nepal will be in need for 10,000 megawatts of electricity by 2040. The three-year study held under the title ‘The Benefits of Expanding Cross – Border Electricity Cooperation and Trade in South Asia’ has shown that electricity demand in domestic consumption for Nepal after 25 years will touch on 10,000 megawatts.
WB researchers Michael Toman and Govinda Timilsina carried out the study weighing countries’ capacity for generating electricity, inter-nation trade and production demand to meet the goal among the South Asian countries excluding the Maldives. In the report, the researchers have stated that Nepal can generate 52,000 megawatts of electricity.
Nepal will have to spend Rs 800 billion to meet the domestic demand for electricity of 10,000 megawatt after 25 years, the research showed. The World Bank has invested a total of around Rs 35 billion in Nepal on various energy projects and in hydro power. It has proposed an ambitious plan for spending Rs 100 billion in addition in electricity generation, development and reformation programs.
Speaking at a program held to launch the research report, researcher duo Timilsina and Toman shared that the study had indicated that regional trade of electricity did not grow as anticipated due to slow pace of regional cooperation, policy level and technical improvement and lack of institutional system.
The study has underlined the need for Nepal – with unbounded possibility of electricity generation – to seek institutional reformation of the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA), form a separate body for transmission and electricity generation and to adopt multi-buyer model from single buyer model and build trade linkages with Bangladesh among other countries. Nepal must keep at the centre the expansion of market-based power trade linkages with India, expand investment for broader development of hydro power sector and ramp up policy-level and institutional reformation, according to the study.
