The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) on Thursday issued a show-cause notice to K-Electric over its failure to supply electricity to Karachi residents without any interruption.

The NEPRA said in the show-cause notice that K-Electric failed to enhance its power generation capacity according to the requirement and restore power supply to consumers in given time. Also, K-Electric failed to upgrade its supply and distribution system to ensure uninterrupted power supply to its consumers, NEPRA said in the notice.

According to NEPRA, its fact-finding team visited Karachi and found no evidence vis-à-vis K-Electric’s claims about furnace oil storage. K-Electric failed to ensure storage of 120,000 ton furnace oil. NEPRA said it found during the investigation that K-Electric did not run the Qasim Power Plan to its full generation capacity. The authority said that K-Electric was not using its power plants according to their generation capacity or taking care of them as required. K-Electric is facing a shortfall of 188 megawatts per day.

NEPRA said that it has already allowed K-Electric to set up new power plants, including the Bin Qasim-3 Power Plant. K-Electric shifted its approved budget to consumers, but failed to achieve the targets. Despite clear instructions from NEPRA, K-Electric failed to reach an agreement on gas supply with the Sui Southern Gas Company Limited. Also, K-Electric failed to reach power purchase agreements with private sector power plants and failed to fulfil its responsibilities in the fuel supply agreement with the Pakistan State Oil.

Directing K-Electric to submit its reply within 15 days, NEPRA asked it to explain why should not strict legal action be initiated against it, why shouldn’t a heavy fine be imposed on it under Section 5b of the NEPRA Act and why shouldn’t K-Electric’s licence should be cancelled or suspended?

NEPRA told K-Electric to submit its reply within 15 days or be ready to face unilateral action.