Energy regulatory bodies of the SAARC countries are likely to form a common forum to facilitate trans-border energy trade in the region, officials said. The decision is likely to be finalised today at the first SAARC energy regulators’ meeting which began on Sunday at a hotel in Dhaka, they said.
‘We are trying to create a forum of the SAARC energy regulators,’ Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission chairman AR Khan told New Age.
Bangladesh hosted the meeting following a framework agreement for regional power trade which was signed during the 18th SAARC summit held on November 27 in Kathmandu, Nepal.
The BERC chairman said that trans-border trade would include natural gas, coal, fuel oil and electricity.
The forum would work for removing legal and other technical barriers to develop a common energy market aimed at increasing per capita energy consumption to raise the standard of living in the region, he said.
He also pointed out that SAARC region is at the bottom of the list of regional power consumption in the world, only 500 kilowatt-hour or units.
State minister for power, energy and mineral resources Nasrul Hamid inaugurated the two-day SAARC energy regulators’ meeting with energy division secretary Abu Bakar Siddique in the chair.
Nasrul said that the governments of the SAARC countries were trying to create an energy belt.
Relationship among the SAARC countries was improving for trans-border power trade, he said.
He said, ‘Use of fossil fuel is affecting environment in the region which has already raised concerns of the environmentalists. So we are trying to tap the environment-friendly hydro-electricity potentials in Nepal and Bhutan.’
India under bilateral agreements is now trading electricity with Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan.
Bangladesh imports 500 MW of electricity from India.
-With New Age input
