Govt working to resolve energy crisis in two years: Minister

The government is working to overcome the country’s energy crisis completely within the next two years, State Minister for Power and Energy Anindya Islam Amit said on Tuesday.

He made the remarks at a seminar titled “Energy Sector Crisis: Prospects and Ways Forward”, organised by the Forum for Energy Reporters Bangladesh at Dhaka Club.

The state minister acknowledged that electricity and energy supplies are currently falling short of demand and apologised on behalf of the ministry for the shortfall.

He said the ongoing gas crisis is partly due to an outage at one of the country’s floating LNG terminals, or FSRUs. Operations at one of the terminal’s boilers have resumed, but fully restoring the facility would require shutting down the boiler currently in operation, he explained.

“We are continuing discussions to find a solution,” Amit said.

He also said the government has set a target of generating 10,000 megawatts of electricity from renewable energy sources within the next four and a half years.

At the same time, initiatives are underway to strengthen the capacity of state-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration and Production Company (BAPEX), he added.

Energy experts at the seminar, however, warned that there is no quick solution to the country’s energy crisis. They said the pressure on natural gas supplies must be reduced to prevent the situation from worsening.

They also called for an end to irregularities in the energy sector and urged fundamental reforms, warning that failure to bring about major changes could leave the government facing the same kind of criticism and accountability as previous administrations.