Pakistan an energy starved country issued licenses for bagasse-based electricity generation to three companies in a hope to meet the target 9,700MW by 2030 using renewable resources for energy generation.

A bagasse-based generation or co-generation in Punjab with a capacity of 31MW get a license from Indus Energy Limited and 26MW in Sindh gets a license from Mirpurkhas Energy Limited and Faran Energy Limited.

National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) determined to switch to renewable resources as most of the power plants are thermal and imports fossils fuels to run them. The country is heavily skewed due to existing mix of energy.

Energy Security Action Plan 2005 duly be familiar with the fact of relying more on renewable resources and encourages the development of power plants generated by renewable resources.

In an interview, chief executive officer Amjad Ali Awan of Alternative Energy Development Board’s (AEDB) said that capacity of installed renewable energy power plants is about 1,350MW. In the next half of the year, renewable sources like solar, wind and sugarcane bagasse will add more than 1,000 megawatts to the current system.

He added that wind plant holds the capacity of about 790MW and can be brought to 1,240MW while sugarcane bagasse-based power plant targets 160MW by the end of 2018. Biomass based power projects have exponential growth in recent years. Sugar mills are already engaged in power generation to fulfill their needs and surplus is given to other industries.