“Enhancing energy security and air quality are critical economic and development priorities for Bangladesh,” said Gayle Martin, World Bank Interim Country Director for Bangladesh said in a statement.

“By addressing the root causes of gas supply constraints and urban air pollution, these two projects will help Bangladesh boost economic growth, improve productivity, and create jobs.”

The Energy Sector Security Enhancement Project ($350 million) will help improve gas supply security by facilitating access to cost-effective financing for Petrobangla, the state-owned oil and gas company.

The project will utilize an IDA (International Development Association) guarantee to mobilize up to $2.1 billion in private capital over seven years for new Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) imports. The backing of an IDA guarantee will improve Petrobangla’s creditworthiness to secure LNG supplies.

Imported LNG accounts for over one-fourth of total gas consumption in Bangladesh. About 42 per cent of total gas consumption is in the power sector.

Hence, gas supply shortages disrupt electricity generation, negatively impacting the economy. This project will provide payment security and working capital solutions to facilitate LNG imports under long-term contract and thereby reduce dependency on expensive spot market gas imports.

 “The project will help Bangladesh enhance gas supply security in a cost-efficient manner, contributing to reliable and affordable electricity for industries and domestic users,” Olayinka Bisiriyu Edebiri, World Bank Senior Energy Specialist and Task Team Leader for the program, said.

 “By ensuring reliable gas supply, the project will help boost economic growth and resilience.”

The Bangladesh Clean Air Project ($290 million) will take a comprehensive approach to tackle air pollution.

In Bangladesh, air pollution caused over 159,000 premature deaths and 2.5 billion days of illness, with estimated health costs equivalent to 8.3 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019.

Dhaka remains one of the most polluted cities in the world with annual levels of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) exceeding by 18 times the WHO Air Quality Guidelines.

The project will help focus on air quality management by strengthening Department of Environment’s air quality monitoring network with new and improved stations.

It will help operationalize the Continuous Emissions Monitoring Program for real-time monitoring of major industrial sources of air pollution.

Based on an integrated network of automated monitoring systems, the monitoring program will allow enforcement of emissions limits, and disclosure of preliminary data collected at major sources.

The project aims to improve vehicle emissions control and introduce a fleet of 400 zero-emission electric bus services by replacing aging, polluting diesel buses.

These buses will operate under a unified “single operator per franchise” model for better service quality. The project will establish depots for charging, parking, and maintaining the electric buses.

It will construct five new Vehicle Inspection Centers, upgrade two non-functioning ones, and deploy mobile Vehicle Inspection Centers and 20 mobile vehicle emissions testing units. Combined, these interventions in the transport sector are expected to reduce primary PM2.5 emissions by approximately 2,734 metric tons per year.

 “This will be the first in a new series of projects to improve the country’s air quality,” Ana Luisa Gomes Lima, World Bank Lead Environment Specialist and Task Team Leader for the project said.

“As air travels across borders, no single country can contain air pollution on its own. The project will facilitate regional dialogue and data sharing for reducing air pollution.”

The World Bank was among the first development partners to support Bangladesh following its independence. Since then, the World Bank has committed over $45 billion in grants, zero- and low-interest credits to Bangladesh. In recent years, Bangladesh has been among the largest recipients of the World Bank’s concessional financing from IDA.

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File photo: Moneycontrol

Manila, Philippines (BBN)- The Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) Board of Directors has approved a $500 million loan to develop a 800 megawatt (MW) power plant in Khulna of Bangladesh.

The ADB-financed project design will ensure that the Rupsha plant uses the latest combined cycle technology, which offers the highest efficiency to convert gas to electricity.

“It will also use the most advanced water treatment processes to purify and recycle liquid waste at the end of the industrial process, leaving zero discharge,” the ADB said in a statement.

To supply gas to the Rupsha power plant, the project will construct gas distribution pipelines of 12 kilometers (km).

The project will also finance construction of a 230-kilovolt switchyard at the power plant and 29 km of high capacity transmission lines to transfer generated electricity from Rupsha to the grid.

To ensure adequate institutional capacity, the project will conduct overall institutional strengthening of the executing agency, the North-West Power Generation Company Limited, including business processes upgrade and training for implementation and operation of the system, maintenance, monitoring, and environment and social safeguards.

The total cost of the project is $1.14 billion, with the Islamic Development Bank contributing $300 million in cofinancing and the government contributing $338.5 million on top of ADB’s support.

The project is due to be completed by the end of June 2022.

Grant financing of $1.5 million will also be provided from ADB’s Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction, funded by the Government of Japan, to improve living standards in nearby communities.

Focusing on vulnerable households and women, activities will include increasing awareness on safe and efficient use of electricity, training on livelihood and job opportunities, and providing school laboratory facilities.

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Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN)- Sustainable and uninterrupted energy is critical for the economic growth, International Chamber of Commerce-Bangladesh (ICCB) said.

The per capita energy consumption in Bangladesh is one of the lowest in the world (433 KWH as of October 2017). The installed capacity of Bangladesh in 1972 was only 200 MW. Since then, the current power generation has increased to 16,046 MW with 600 MW import from India, according to the editorial of the current News Bulletin (Oct-Dec 2017) of the ICCB, released on Sunday.

The capacity has increased due to favorable government policies, which have attracted private investment and Independent Power Producers (IPP).

They are now producing 46 per cent of total power in Bangladesh. Though the government has achieved significant success in electricity generation, actual capacity utilization is 9,507 MW only due to vulnerable and double-digit system loss prevailing in the distribution mechanism.

The Power Sector Master Plan (PSMP) 2015 has a target of 57,000 MW generation by 2041 – 35 per cent coal based, 35 per cent Gas and LNG based and remaining 30 per cent would come from nuclear power, power import and renewable energy.

Of the 30 per cent, about 5.0 per cent would come from imported oil, 5.0 per cent from nuclear and the remaining 20 per cent from renewable energy.

The government has decided to import LNG for the proposed 15,300 MW LNG-based power generation plants. Contracts have already been signed with private sector operators for 7.0 million tonnes (1000MCFD) of annual LNG import.

Also, works are in progress for 22,000 MW imported coal-based power generation by 2041 for which about 66 million tonnes of coal would be needed annually.

The government has taken the initiative for setting up a coal transfer terminal at Matarbari with a capacity of 40 million tonnes annually.

Also, the construction work of the 1,200MW Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant, the first such plant in the country has formally started on 30 November.

The government will import coal despite the fact that Bangladesh has an estimated reserve of some 3.0 billion tonnes of high-quality coal in five coalfields in northern districts.

Experts and the members of the parliamentary standing committee on energy affairs have lent their support for open-pit mining as it is risk-free and cost-effective. But the authorities are reluctant to go ahead with the option of open-pit mining fearing a backlash from the opponents of the system.

Even though the commitment to restrict funding for coal exploration, other Asian nations including China, India, Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam are increasingly prioritising coal to strengthen their economies too. China, India and Indonesia now burn 71 per cent of the world's newly mined coals, according to the World Coal Association.

The failure to adequately manage the load shedding, there is a severe disruption in the industrial production and other economic activities. A recent survey reveals that power outages result in a loss of industrial output worth $1 billion a year which reduces the GDP growth by about half a percentage point in Bangladesh.

It is estimated that the total transmission and distribution losses amount to one-third of the total generation, the value of which is equal to the US $247 million per year.

Therefore, there is a need for the development of appropriate infrastructure and effective monitoring system to overcome the major hurdle in efficiently delivering power.

South Asia’s considerable hydropower potential is concentrated in the Himalayan region, spanning Nepal, Bhutan and India’s northernmost states.

Nepal alone has theoretical hydropower potential of 83,000 MW, but so far, less than 2.0 per cent has been realized while Bhutan has an estimated hydropower capacity of around 30,000 MW.

Bangladesh may explore the possibility of joining Nepal and Bhutan in tapping the vast hydropower resources, the ICCB recommended.

Due to fast depleting gas reserve and lack of major initiatives to develop local coal it is becoming difficult to achieve a sustainable local primary energy source.

According to an estimate, Bangladesh would become 92 per cent dependent on imported fuel by 2030 if local coal is not explored and exploited.

Generation of electricity in coal-fired power plants will be viable and much cheaper if locally explored quality coal is used as fuel instead of imported one.

Bangladesh should, therefore, go for all-out commercial exploration of coal in the next five years to make the power sector, the backbone of the country's economy, sustainable and vibrant.

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