Karachi: Keeping in view the ongoing energy crises and frequent electricity breakdowns in the city, the government plans a project - Establishment of Power Generation System for University of Karachi - which would generate seven megawatts, official sources said on Thursday.

The power generated under this scheme would not only meet the electricity requirements of the university including its residential colonies, but also surplus electricity would be provided to Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC), which was unable to meet its total demand of power from its own generation, the sources maintained.

The total cost of the project would be Rs 504.906 million and the university would purchase six gas engines and steam turbines for power generation.

The scheme would help ensure uninterrupted power supply to the university's research centres and laboratories. The project would also reduce tremendous monthly electricity bills of millions of rupees paid to the KESC. The sources claimed that it would also support the external development requirement (electricity connection) of newly and under constructed buildings.

About the existing facility, the sources said the university was connected with the KESC's 11 kilovolts (KV) network. The 11KV feeder connected the university from its grid station.

The feeder was enough to meet the requirement of the university, but frequent power breakdowns particularly in summer affected the university's labs, departments and residential colonies.

The government has allocated Rs 10 million in the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) 2009-10 for this project, and Higher Education Commission (HEC) is the sponsoring agency while the KU was the executing agency. The project would be completed within 18 months. After the completion of the project, the sources said that the KU would save and earn Rs 71.53 million per annum in terms of bills paid to the KESC and sale of electricity to the utility during off peak hours. The cost of the project would be recovered in six years.

The KU is one of the largest universities of the country, spread over an area of approximately 1,350 acres. It was established as a federal university in 1951 under the Act of Parliament.

Since its inception the university has been developing at a reasonable pace. There are over 24,000 students enrolled as regular students, besides that the university conducts graduate level examination of over 150,000 students of its 145 affiliated colleges or institutes. The university presently imparts education at honors, master, M Phil and PhD levels under Faculties of Arts, Science, Pharmacy, Islamic Studies and Management and Administrative Sciences.

Project consultants (M/S AR Associates and M/S United Engineering Services International) have carried out the feasibility study of the power project. The scheme has been designed by these consultants in line with the Karachi Master Plan with the view of catering to the current and future requirements of the university.

According to the capital cost summary, the total spending of the project was Rs 254.200 million on purchase of imported power generation machinery, Rs 153.700 million on local power generation machinery, Rs 41.400 million would be spent on civil work, Rs 32.332 million on service charges, Rs 4.795 million as cost of programme management unit, Rs 13.479 million would be spent on consultancy and Rs 5 million for contingency services. The total sum of all these expenses was equal to Rs 504.906 million. Daily times