PESHAWAR: The Pakistan Economy Watch (PEW) has said that the government should revisit plans to revive old dams in favour of constructing new dams with special focus on Kalabagh Dam (KBD).
KBD is the most viable and most politicized projects in the history of Pakistan which would cost less and last longer than any other dam in the country, said Dr. Murtaza Mughal, President PEW.
Local and international experts have linked survival of Pakistan to KBD and opined that desilting of Tarbela reservoir is not an economically or technically very viable option.
Tarbela has already lost 30 percent capacity to 6.6 million acre feet to silting over the years but experts say that instead of undertaking massive desilting exercise it would be more economical to build a new dam.
Dr. Murtaza Mughal said that Tarbela dam has an estimated lifespan of 50 years; it would complete its designed life by 2029 while KBD has an estimated life of 450 years.
Pakistan’s per capita water availability had already gone below 975 cubic meters from 5100 cubic meters in 1960 which is a great threat to industry, agriculture and masses which not only require urgent steps.
World Bank had asked Pakistan to build a dam of the size of Tarbela at least every decade but successive governments failed to make a single dam despite resources which indicate lack of interest in securing country’s future.
Dams are built the world over to overcome water shortages and not to create problems. The Mangla dam brought green revolution, the Tarbela dam increased water supply to the canal network by 25 percent while Sindh got an additional seven million acre feet of water while Sindh will get 2.2 million acre feet from Kalabagh, he said.
KBD is neither a technical nor a political issue, rather it is a humanitarian matter related to national survival which is being delayed by some politicians and so called experts to damage the federation on the directions of enemies of Pakistan.
He said that the intensity of recent load-shedding during extremely hot weather in Karachi could have been decreased if KBD was there to provide 3600 MW of electricity to the national grid.
