Development in IPPs case.

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My description for the video is how Pakistan has been pillaged by these electricity companies and those who help implement them.

 

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Paul H Weaver in his book “How Journalism really Works” (The Free Press 1994) writes that the news media and the government are entwined in a vicious circle of mutual manipulation, mythmaking, and self-interest. Journalists need crises to dramatize news, and government officials need to appear to be responding to crises. Too often, the crises are not really crises but joint fabrications. The two institutions have become so ensnared in a symbiotic web of lies that the news media are unable to tell the public what is true and the government is unable to govern effectively.

Additionally, there is another term called “Simpson's Paradox” where a deceitful person can employ statistical data to illustrate to the non-specialist or public audience the kind of misleading results that he desires.

I see both of these in action in the above video. Mr.Imran Khan; believe he works for Dunya News; is using correct numbers to prove the enormity of overcharging ( implying most of it went to line the pockets of the PML-N politicians) while hiding the fact that prices of solar & wind power contracts during the 2013 period of PML-N were signed at that time international prices of Solar & Wing power were much higher than prevailing now and because 18 hours of load shedding during the Zardari era, PMLN gov’t had used the promise of resolving the power problem in a hurry to win the election.

I have spent my entire working carrier in the oil industry and since the alternative energy sources have a direct impact on the use of petroleum, I made a habit of keeping myself informed about the world's alternative/renewable energy scene.

During the last 10 years, the cost of production has dropped 82% for Solar Photovoltaic Energy, by 40% for onshore Windpower and
30% for offshore Windpower. Meaning that what cost 100 dollars in 2010 now can be had for 18 dollars. This decline was the result of a combination of the following factors.:

Improved efficiency, the lower material cost of the non-silicon material (glass, laminating materials, metal paste,etc.), reduction in the polysilicon (Crystalline for of Silicon- the material of the solar cell) price reduction and decreased Silicon use. This had brought down the price of PV Module (PV Cell assembly ready for installation) to about 1/4 of the cost prevailing in 2012. Once Silicon is replaced by Perovskites (Calcium titanium oxide, CaTiO3) family of crystals, module cost will drop even lower.

Wind power also had to become cheap to survive. Improvement in wing design worked wonders. The area swept by the blades goes up with the square of their length. Therefore, even though blade length and rated generating capacity relationships are in parallel, the actual potential energy input from the blades is growing much faster. This lowers what's called the ‘specific power’ of the wind turbine. (Specific power of a turbine is the ratio of its nameplate capacity rating to its rotor-swept area).

Lower specific power turbines work better in areas where the wind isn't as strong or consistent. On the truly windy days, they'll saturate the ability of the generator to extract power, while on a more typical day when the winds are lighter or erratic; they'll get more out of them. Better grid management also helped the economics of wind farms. Construction costs have also nearly halved. These days new wind power plants construction cost at $1.1-million per MW is almost the same as that of gas-powered turbine plants.

Consequently, while the purchase agreements for wind-generated electricity in the USA peaked at about 7 cents per kWh in 2009; in 2018 the national average fell below 2 cents per kWh for the first time in history. The graph below shows what has happened.

Yellow- solar power PVC, orange; concentrated solar power, grey: onshore wind, green: offshore wind.

P.S: Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) consists of concentrating heat (from the sun) into one point. This way, steam is generated to drive the turbine. Furthermore, this type of plant can work constantly, as part of the heat is stored.

https://energynorthern.com/2020/06/03/irena-releases-renewable-power-generation-costs-in-2019/


Finally, perhaps Mr Imran Khan is unaware that Abu Dhabi has set a global record-low solar price as authorities confirmed the winning bid in a 2-gigawatt tender. Upon its expected completion in mid-2022, it is slated to be the largest single-site solar energy project in the world.

The Al Dhafra project had five bidders in 2017, with the lowest offer coming in at 1.35 U.S. cents per kilowatt-hour. The state-run Abu Dhabi Power Corporation (AD Power) confirmed to GTM that the leading consortium consists of French energy giant EDF and the projects division of Chinese solar manufacturer Jinko Solar.

AD Power will now negotiate a 30-year power-purchase agreement with EDF/Jinko. If an agreement cannot be reached, AD Power, part of the Emirates Water and Electricity Company, can negotiate with the second-best bidder.

https://www.greentechmedia.com/arti...st-solar-project-will-also-be-worlds-cheapest

However, like Mr. Imran Khan, I would not question the integrity of PTI for purchasing solar power at 3.67 cents per KWhr when Abu Dhabi gets it at 1.35 cents because many factors are different. For example, Abu Dhabi has more sunshine hours, large flat land, and virtually zero land cost couple with cheap finance.

The reason for higher prices for earlier plants is simply because at the time of award international prices were much higher and the circumstances have since changed. If you bought August delivery Brent crude in on July 3, 2008, because you needed to ensure feedstock for your refinery, you paid $145 per bbl. Whereas the refiners who purchased in December 2008 paid only $32 per bbl. Does it mean that buyers in July pocketed $113 per bbl. to line their pocket?

I am certain that some money changed hands as agent's “Commission” who probably shared the same with the big bosses, But it was no more than a fraction of what Mr.Imran Khan is alleging in his video. It is precisely because of such exaggerated claims that NAB has consistently failed to prove the charges of supposed massive corruption in the court of law.