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Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government has signed a huge contract of 442 billion Pakistani Rupees (PKR) with a joint venture of a Chinese state-owned company and a commercial arm of the Pakistan Army for the construction of the Diamer-Bhasha Dam.
Chinese state-owned company China Power owns 70% and the Border Works Organization (FWO), a commercial arm of the Pakistan Armed Forces, 30% of the consortium, the Dawn newspaper reported.
The contract signed on Wednesday covers the construction of a diversion system, main dam, access bridge and the 21MW Tangir hydro project.
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The eight million acre foot reservoir (MAF) with a height of 272 meters will be the tallest Roller Compact Concrete Dam (RCC) in the world. It will have a spillway, 14 doors and five exits to clean the sediment. The diversion system involves two tunnels and a diversion channel, all three of which are one kilometer each, the newspaper said.
The bridge, a box girder structure, under the contract will be built downstream of the dam structure, while the 21MW power plant will be built to meet the project’s energy requirements during construction.
Prime Minister Khan was briefed on the progress of the project a couple of days ago. Construction work on the dam will begin in a couple of weeks.
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The executive director of the Diamer-Bhasha Dam project, Amir Bashir Chaudhry, and the authorized representative of China Power Yang Jiandu signed the agreement on behalf of the Water and Energy Development Authority (WAPDA) and the joint venture, respectively.
Water Resources Minister Faisal Vawda, Chinese Ambassador Yao Jing, Wate Resources Secretary Mohammad Ashraf, Wapda President, Retired Lt. Gen. Muzammil Hussain, Chief Engineer of the Pakistan Army, Lt. General Moazzam Ejaz and the CEO of FWO, General Kamal Azfar. Attended the signing ceremony.
The Wapda president expressed his hope that the Diamer-Bhasha dam will be completed on schedule to meet the country’s growing water and electricity requirements. The dam project with a total financial outlay of approximately PKR 1,406.5 billion will be completed in 2028, he said.
The total financial outlay includes land acquisition and resettlement, confidence-building measures for the social improvement of the local population, construction of dams and power houses.
General Muzammil Hussain said the project would have a gross storage capacity of 8.1 MAF and a power generation capacity of 4,500MW. However, the electromechanical and power generation project would be addressed separately at a later stage.
Wapda has already awarded a PKR 27,182 million contract for dam consulting services to Diamer-Bhasha Consultants Group (DBCG). The consulting agreement includes construction design, construction supervision, and contract management of the dam project.
The Common Interests Council (JRC) had approved the project for construction in 2010, but suffered delays due to international lending agencies that remained associated with the project but later fell back due to opposition from India, as most of the dam is in Gilgit. – Baltistan, the newspaper said.
The government has already spent around 170 billion PKR on the project since then on land acquisition and other expenses.
In view of the lenders’ resistance, about four years ago it was decided to divide the multipurpose project into two main components: a PKR 650 billion dam project to be built with public sector funds and an energy project for 750 billion PKR value Most likely to develop in Independent Power Producer (IPP) mode at a later stage, the newspaper added.
Development of the core project (dam structure) is estimated to cost only almost 270 billion PKR. The project offers a very attractive internal economic return of 15.7%, even at a discount rate of 12%, according to project documents.
The project is designed to serve as the country’s main storage dam, in addition to the Mangla and Tarbela dams, and its storage would be useful in alleviating flood losses. The dam will have a usable water storage capacity of 6.4 MAF.
The project is expected to help alleviate the acute shortage of irrigation in the Indus basin irrigation system caused by the progressive sedimentation of existing reservoirs, in addition to contributing substantially to reducing the intensity, amount and duration of flooding. and reduce the magnitude and frequency of flooding in the downstream Indus River.
The project will also have trickling effects on all sectors of the economy by accelerating development and creating job opportunities, as well as improving the availability of clean water and energy.
Completion of the dam would increase the country’s storage capacity from 30 to 48 days and make power generation facilities an attractive future investment by the private sector to add 4,500MW of additional electricity to the national grid, according to Dawn.
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