Rising worries about
climate change have recently made me join the Clean Energy Revolution by installing rooftop solar and leasing an electric car. What is the Clean Energy Revolution? It is the growing use of solar panels, battery storage and electric vehicles to reduce carbon emissions. Is Pakistan ready to join the Clean Energy Revolution?
Tesla Electric Cars:Silicon Valley is at the forefront of this
clean energy revolution led by Tesla. Tesla is more than an electric car company; the company also supplies solar panels and batteries. Other automakers are also taking their cues from Tesla. China's BYD Auto has only recently been surpassed by Tesla in production volumes. Auto giants
General Motors and
BMW are both building electric cars and planning to build "gigafactories" like Tesla's to manufacture battery packs for vehicles and homes. Pakistan is building up renewable power generation capacity. The country has also recently announced its
National Electric Vehicle Policy that offers incentives to transition to clean energy.
Bloomberg estimates that Batteries and electric transmission account for about 40% of passenger cars’ costs. European demand is met by mainly Japanese and South Korean battery makers like Panasonic, LG Chem Ltd. and Samsung SDI Co. In the U.S., Tesla has built its own
battery cells at its Gigafactory to manage costs and satisfy demand for the cars it produces. Chinese demand for battery packs is met by BYD.
Battery Backed Renewable Energy Costs:High-capacity battery pack costs have dropped nearly 40% since 2015, according to Wood Mackenzie data as reported by
Wall Street Journal. The prices of lithium and vanadium—two of several key raw materials that are used in such batteries—also have declined over the past year or so.
Battery storage costs have fallen nearly 90% in the past decade, according to NextEra Energy. Cost reductions are expected to continue to only
$8 to $14 per MW-hour by 2020, or about a penny per kW-hour. For perspective, the average kW-hour of electricity costs about 13 cents for retail users.
NextEra Energy forecasts that post-2023, wind plus energy storage costs will be $20 to $30 per MW-hour, and solar plus energy storage will be $30 to $40 per MW-hour. Natural gas is expected to match the solar-plus-storage costs.
Pakistan Electric Vehicle Policy:Pakistan has a low level of motorization with just 9% of the
households owning a car. Nearly half of all households
own a motorcycle. Motorization rates in the country have tripled over the last decade and a half, resulting in nearly 40% of all emissions coming from vehicles. Concerns about climate change and environmental pollution have forced the government to to take a number of actions ranging from adoption of Euro6 emission standards for new vehicles with internal combustion engines (ICE) since 2015 and announcement of a national electric vehicle (EV) policy this year.
Private vehicle ownership in Pakistan has risen sharply over the last 4 years. More than 9% of households now own cars, up from 6% in 2015.
Motorcycle ownership has jumped from 41% of households in 2015 to 53% now, according to data released by Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS) recently. There are
32.2 million households in Pakistan, according to 2017 Census.
Pakistan's
National EV Policy is a forward looking step needed to deal with climate concerns from growing
transport sector emissions with rapidly rising vehicle ownership. It offers tax incentives for buyers and sellers. It also focuses on development of nationwide charging infrastructure to ease adoption of electric vehicles.
Low Carbon Energy Growth:
In recent years, Pakistan government has introduced a number of supportive policies, including
feed-in tariffs and a
net metering program to incentivize renewables. These have been fairly successful, and renewables capacity in the country surged substantially over 2018 when 1245 MW was added, of which 826MW was contributed by the solar sector, according to
Fitch Solutions.Pakistan’s Alternative Energy Development Board (AEDB) recently signed deals for projects that will see the country expand its wind power capacity by 560 MW.
Fitch Solutions forecasts Pakistan's solar capacity to grow by an annual average of 9.4% between 2019-2028, taking total capacity over 3.8GW by the end of our forecast period.
Sindh government has recently signed a deal for 400MW solar park at Manjhand, 20MW rooftop solar systems on public sector buildings in Karachi and Hyderabad, and 200,000 solar home systems for remote areas in 10 districts of the province. The project is estimated to cost USD105million, with the World Bank funding USD100 million.
The biggest and most important source of low-carbon energy in Pakistan is its hydroelectric power plants. Pakistan ranked third in the world by adding nearly 2,500 MW of hydropower in 2018, according to
Hydropower Status Report 2019. China added the most capacity with the installation of 8,540 megawatts, followed by Brazil (3,866 MW), Pakistan (2,487 MW), Turkey (1,085 MW), Angola (668 MW), Tajikistan (605 MW), Ecuador (556 MW), India (535 MW), Norway (419 MW) and Canada (401 MW).
Hydropower now makes up about 28% of the total installed capacity of 33,836 MW as of February, 2019. WAPDA reports contributing 25.63 billion units of hydroelectricity to the national grid during the year, “despite the fact that water flows in 2018 remained historically low.” This contribution “greatly helped the country in meeting electricity needs and lowering the electricity tariff for the consumers.”
Chinese BYD in Pakistan:Multiple
media reports suggest that China's BYD is about to enter Pakistan market following the announcement of Pakistan National EV Policy. These reports indicate that Toyota, one of the largest automakers in Pakistan, has signed a deal with BYD to manufacture electric vehicles.
Other reports indicate that Pakistan's
Rahmat Group is in talks with BYD to set up an electric vehicle plant at Nooriabad in Sindh province.
Minister for Science and Technology Fawad Chaudhry has claimed that in three years Pakistan will become the first country to manufacture electric buses, which will be driven by an electric motor and obtains energy from on-board batteries.
Summary: It appears that Pakistan is starting to get serious about joining the Clean Energy Revolution to deal with rising
climate change concerns. The country has set targets for renewable energy growth and announced National
Electric Vehicle Policy. In recent years, Pakistan government has introduced a number of supportive policies, including
feed-in tariffs and a
net metering program to incentivize renewables. These have been fairly successful, and renewables capacity in the country surged substantially over 2018 when 1245 MW was added, of which 826MW was contributed by the solar sector, according to
Fitch Solutions. High-capacity battery pack costs have dropped nearly 40% since 2015, according to Wood Mackenzie data as reported by
Wall Street Journal. Cost reductions are expected to continue to only
$8 to $14 per MW-hour by 2020, or about a penny per kW-hour. While production and use of renewable energy are growing, the electric vehicles in Pakistan have yet to find traction. Hopefully, the National EV policy will encourage production and adoption of electric vehicles in the country.
Related Links:
Haq's MusingsSouth Asia Investor ReviewPakistan Electric Vehicle PolicyNuclear Power in PakistanRecurring Cycles of Drought and Floods in PakistanPakistan's Response to Climate ChangeMassive Oil and Gas Discovery in Pakistan: Hype vs RealityRenewable Energy for PakistanDigital BRI: China and Pakistan Building Fiber, 5G NetworksLNG Imports in PakistanGrowing Water Scarcity in PakistanChina-Pakistan Economic CorridorOwnership of Appliances and Vehicles in PakistanCPEC Transforming PakistanPakistan's $20 Billion Tourism Industry BoomRiaz Haq's YouTube ChannelPakAlumni Social Network
