Tuesday, June 30, 2026

Pakistan Electricity Consumption Up 21% in Just Two Years

Pakistan is experiencing surging demand for electricity across all of the sectors of its economy. The new demand is being met by rapidly rising deployment of distributed solar, estimated at 38 GW as of June, 2025. In 2025, 44% of solar deployment was residential, followed by industry (26%), agriculture (21%) and commercial users (9%). The expansion of distributed solar has enhanced electrification across the economy, lifting Pakistan's electrification rate to 21.7% in FY2025 from 17% in FY2023, close to the global average of 22%, according to a report by Ember Energy titled "The solarization of Pakistan's energy economy". 


The solar energy revolution in Pakistan is a led by consumers. Driven by soaring electricity costs, unreliable grid infrastructure, and cheap imported solar panels, millions of households and businesses have installed rooftop solar. This rapid transition has transformed the country's energy landscape.  According to the report, Pakistan’s total electricity demand increased by 33 terawatt-hours (TWh) between fiscal years 2023 and 2025. Distributed solar generation alone grew by 36 TWh during the same period, making it the primary driver of electricity demand growth and offsetting declines elsewhere in the power system.


"Pakistan has a thirst for energy, and solar is providing it," said Dave Jones, Chief Analyst at Ember. "Distributed solar is so fast and cheap to build, that it is actually driving up electricity demand."  The newly added solar capacity has saved more than US$12 billion in oil and gas imports by February, 2026, Ember said, as well as enabling growth in the agriculture, industrial and commercial parts of Pakistan’s economy.

The report shows that net metered solar is a “minority” of Pakistan’s current capacity, with far more behind-the-meter and off-grid capacity than registered net metering solar.   Distributed solar has ramped up rapidly. In just two years, 27 GW of distributed solar was installed, the same amount of operating coal, gas and oil plants built in Pakistan ever. Distributed solar is also cheaper — residential solar with a medium battery makes electricity at around PKR 20/KWh, half the PKR 40 price for grid electricity. The government statistics only capture the net-metered part of the electricity. 

During the first nine months of 2025-26 fiscal year, Pakistan’s energy sector saw steady improvement during the first nine months of the current fiscal year, with hydro, renewable and nuclear sources overtaking fossil-fuel-based thermal power in installed generation capacity for the first time, according to the Pakistan Economic Survey for 2025-26. 





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