The New Nation - Internet Edition

THE new government to take over shortly must lose no time in improving the country's energy supply. This is a desperate need, indeed, to meet the economy's present and growing needs. And to this end, it must start work decisively for utilising the vast but unutilised coal resources. Coal can be a very useful and effective source of energy to ensure energy security. But to utilise the country's coal reserves a bold decision and its immediate implementation are necessary. Bangladesh has huge coal reserves. But the country is yet to tap the potentials.

The government should be open, free from political considerations and come out of conservative approaches. Appropriate decisions should be taken without fear or favour and adequate measures should follow for their quick implementation. Bangladesh is already lagging behind other countries in utilising coal resources. The global practice is that around 70-80 per cent of coal is used in power plants in the coal-rich countries like USA, China, Germany and Australia. Despite having huge potentials Bangladesh has only one 250 MW coal-fired power plant, which is also struggling for shortages of coal due to application of wrong mining methods in the Barapukuria coalmine.

The gas reserves of the country are depleting fast as demand grows and there is no alternative but to extract and use the coal resources. The preferred option for Bangladesh would be to use coal for base load power generation and earmark gas resource for other productive uses. As Bangladesh has no expertise in coalmining, one or two coalmines should be developed with foreign assistance under contracts. The remaining coalmines should be kept for local companies to develop. Arrangements should also be there to develop local expertise by working with foreign companies.