Energy in Limbo
Shailesh Wasti
It would not be an exaggeration to say that today’s world runs on oil. Yet, its reserves are depleting and it won’t be a surprise if the world witnesses fuel crisis sooner or later. This scarcity as well as the alarming threats of carbon emissions resulting from the use of fuel poses to the climate and consequently the health of the world’s inhabitants, has instigated the scientists, economists and politicians to seek for alternatives. Meanwhile global bodies like the UN have also pressed for the adoption of stringent measures to curb threats of the carbon emission. In these contexts, seeking for renewable energy seems to be the best alternative if it becomes technologically feasible and economically competitive among different sources.
Renewables include sources as solar, wind, hydropower and bio gas. Although Nepal’s topography is favorable for solar energy, solar technology is not fully developed and a great deal of research is needed to attain this technological advancement. But Nepal has no capacity to fund such a large scale project currently. Other possible sources of renewable energy have similar problems.
No doubt then that hydropower becomes a viable option. Nepal embarked on hydroelectricity production with Pharping Hydropower project, which was established in 1911, almost 29 years after the world’s first hydroelectric power plant began operation in Wisconsin, USA.
Although Nepal’s hydroelectricity potential is estimated at 83,000 megawatts, we have not yet harnessed 1000 megawatts. According to energy expert Ratna Sansar Shrestha, Nepal today has deficit of 5000 MW of electricity. We have to increase its production by at least five folds to meet the demand in order to materialize the dream of prosperous Nepal envisioned by our policy makers. The per capita electric power consumption by an average Nepali is around 100 kWh while that of an American is around 13, 000 kWh. This is a strong indication of how much power starved we are.
Despite knowing much earlier about the need through different load forecasts, Nepal did not explore its potential, but engaged in the fruitless debate of how to balance the surplus electricity. For a decade, pseudo-intellects including government officers, ministers and so-called energy experts kept on chasing the zombie idea that Nepal will one day prosper by selling its electricity to its immediate neighbor India, just like Qatar and Saudi Arabia changed their faces by selling oil. This idea is zombie in the sense that our hydrocrats believed that India’s direct investment to Nepal would together electrify Nepal and some states of India, hence creating for win-win situation.
Thomas Piketty, in his magnum opus ‘Capital’ writes that ‘none of the Asian countries that have moved to the developed countries of the west in the recent years has benefitted from large foreign investments whether it be Japan, South Korea or Taiwan and more recently China. In essence, all of these countries themselves financed the necessary investments in physical capital…which the latest research holds to the key to long-term growth.’ He further adds those who welcomed had to face ‘chronic political instability’ and became ‘unsuccessful’.
India’s direct investment could be suicidal for Nepal if one is to follow Piketty’s argument. Had Nepal generated surplus electricity and interconnected with states in India, we possibly would have upper hand at the time of blockade. But today we are able to do nothing but stand in long queues. This is high time Nepal embarked on a path from being dependent to interdependent economy and create a solid economic foundation. One question will presumably arise: will Nepal be able to fund the mega-projects? To those skeptics who believe Nepal can’t, Upper Tamakoshi, a project of 456 megawatts, is a beautiful example.
(Wasti is a faculty member at the Department of Electrical Engineering, Kathmandu Engineering College. He can be reached at shailesh.wasti@gmail.com)
