Construction Of New Storage Reservoirs Required To Address Water Shortage: NA Told

State Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Dr. Darshan informed the National Assembly that construction of new storage reservoirs can address theshortage of water in the country

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 06th Nov, 2017 ) :State Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Dr. Darshan informed the National Assembly that construction of new storage reservoirs can address theshortage of water in the country.

Responding to a question during question hour, he said presently about 9.7 million acre feet water was being wasted due to non construction of water reservoirs. He said WAPDA has acquired 31696 acres of land out of total requirement of 37419 acres for Diamer Basha dam project.

Besides that, construction of infrastructure and preliminary works,i.e. project colony at Thor Valley, Composite Model Village-II at Harpan Dam are in progress. Work on the main dam could not be started due to non-arrangement of finances from donor agencies.

Government has decided to finance the dam portion of the project through Federal PSDP, he added Construction of dam was divided in two parts including Dam Part and Power Generation Part. PC-I of Dam part has been submitted to the Planning Commission on March 24, while the PC-I for implementation of Power Generation Part of the project will be submitted by the year 2020 after initiating progress on construction of dam.

The dam will become operational after 9 years of commencement of works, he added. He said Dasu Hydro Power Project has been facing problems in acquisition of land due to its location in district Kohistan.

The area is a non-settled area where land record is not available. WAPDA has established a separate Land Acquisition& Assessment Unit under DC Kohistan which is responsible for preparation of revenue record.

The survey and revenue record of some of the priority areas are in process of finalization and the remaining will be completed shortly, he added. PC-II for Feasibility Study of Akhori Dam project (600 MW and 6.0 MAF) was approved by CDWP on November 13, 2003.

The study was completed in 2006. This project is not included in PSDP of current year. Therefore, no work is in progress on this project. However, as per priority of the government and allocation of required resources further steps will be taken to implement the project.

About Patan Hydropower project, he said it is a planned run-of river hydropower project on Indus River with 2400 MW capacity. Detailed Engineering Design and preparation of tender documents would be started after arranging funds.