Govt mulling over monthly adjustment of power, energy prices: Nasrul Hamid

State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid said on Monday that the government is working on a plan to introduce a system for adjusting power and energy prices every month.

"We're working on a plan to adjust power and energy prices every month", he told reporters on the sidelines of a contract signing ceremony at Bidyut Bhaban on Monday.

He also said there is no relation between the government's move and the public hearing of the Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC).

"BERC will do its own job and make their decisions. We have amended the BERC rules so that we could go for adjustment of prices every month", he said.

"Already our neighboring countries have introduced the monthly price adjustment system", he added.

He said globally the energy prices have gone up and inflation is rising. "So, we have to go for the adjustment".

He said the main objective of the amendment to the existing BERC Act is to make decisions by the government on certain cases.

He also noted that the subsidy of the government to the power and energy sector will continue as the recent price hike would not cover the full loss in the sector.

He said if the price adjustment is made, then at least backlog made due to financial losses in gas import would be possible to overcome.

Responding to a question, he said the government is expecting that there will not be much load shedding in the coming summer like last summer.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh China Renewable Energy Company (Pvt) Limited (BCRECL), a subsidiary of the North-West Power Generation Company Limited and CMC, China, signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) and an implementation agreement (IA) with the state-owned Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) and the government to set up a 68-MW solar power plant at Sirajganj.

As per the agreements, the BPDB will purchase electricity from the plant at 10.20 US Cents per unit over the period of 20 years.

The BCRECL will invest $87.71 million to set up the plant where ZTENCO Limited Bangladesh will act as consultant while Consortium of Perioshen-Fedi-Sinohydro, China will act as EPC contractor for the project.

Addressing the function Nasrul said the government has wanted to generate 2000 MW of electricity from renewable energy sources in the next one year.