Electricity supply pathways based on renewable resources: A sustainable energy future for Pakistan

Electricity generation in Pakistan heavily relies on imported fossil fuels. The import of such fuels is a huge financial burden on the national exchequer. Studies focusing on the costs and benefits of the renewable resources for power generation lack environmental and externality costs estimation which makes the Business as Usual scenario as a least cost option in Pakistan. This paper compares five supply side scenarios to find the best competitor of Business as Usual scenario and technically tries to increase the share of renewable resources in electricity generation. It uses electricity sector of Pakistan as a case study and forecast electricity demand in all the sectors. The hypothesis is what will be the savings in cost and what would be the environmental benefits for progressing in alternative pathways. This hypothesis is designed to find the best policy decision for increasing the share of renewable in energy mix of Pakistan. LEAP framework is used to test the hypothesis. The study findings suggest that the electricity generation from Business as Usual scenario is five times expensive than the solar, wind and hydel scenarios. Therefore, the energy planners of Pakistan in particular and the developing countries in general should incentivize electricity generation from renewable resources to increase their penetration.