STAFF REPORT IBD: Speakers at a seminar titled “Energy Crisis and Coal Reserves in Pakistan: Potential, Problems and Prospects” have said that corruption, nepotism and poor governance are the main reasons behind the country’s failure in energy sector in Pakistan, and called for drastic measures, such as focus on large scale mechanized coal mining to produce various forms of energy from it to lessen the intensity of the power crisis.

Usman Amin-ud-Din, former minister for petroleum and natural resources, said, “We are a nation sitting over the second largest reserves of coal in the world but still facing the worst energy crisis merely because of cumbersome practices, lack of vision and poor planning.”

He regretted that despite having the second largest coal reserves of 184 billion metric tons in the world after the US, but not a single unit of electricity is being produced in Pakistan through coal unfortunately.

Referring to the recent efforts for utilizing the Thar Coal through under-ground gasification as being in the experimental stage, he opined that the technology is at a pilot stage in the US since 1960s and there are 14 major drawbacks of this technology out of which the American experts have been able to address only six so far.

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