$3 b required to payoff PDB liabilities

Current fiscal year

Mahfuja Mukul: Foreign exchange reserves are rapidly depleting. Net reserves fell to $13 billion yesterday. Meanwhile, the dollar crisis is disrupting coal imports. Various power plants often sit in the coal and gas crisis. Load shedding is going on nationwide. Apart from this, loan installments of various projects are due. Electricity import bills from India are also not being paid regularly. All in all, the power sector is at risk due to the dollar crisis.
The Power Development Board (PDB) needs $3 billion to pay the liabilities of various sectors till next month (June). This information has been presented as one of the organization. It can be seen that the highest liability of PDB is currently in electricity import from India. Then there are coal import bills, loan installments for Payra and Rampal power plants, loan installments for PDB’s own eight power plants and bills for purchase of parts for PDB’s power plants.
According to the data of PDB, the bill of electricity import from India has to be paid in the current financial year of $1.717 billion. Four private sector coal-fired power plants will have to pay $862 million in coal import bills. $115 million to pay off the loan installments of eight power plants built by PDB. Payra power plant and Rampal power plant loan installment payment of $226 million and PDB power plant parts purchase of $84 million.
As of last December, PDB owed about $869 million. Out of this, the electricity import bill from India was $743 million and the coal import bill was $126 million. Of this, Rampal’s coal import bill was $45 million and SS Power’s was $81 million. This year, $271.71 million were due in January and $300.74 million in February. Besides, $422.73 million will be needed for March, $334 million in April, $318.66 million in May and $487 million in June.
Analysis of monthly data shows that the electricity import bill will be $144.57 million for January, $160.05 million for February, $169.62 million for March, $171.35 million for April, $165.49 million for May and $163.35 million for June. The coal import bill will be $102.34 million for January, $108.80 million for February, $134.92 million for March, $130.57 million for April, $131.80 million for May and $127.55 million for June.
Among the coal import bills, Payra Power Plant has $293.32 million, Rampal needs $203.40 million, SS Power $159.33 million and Barisal Electric about $80 million. Apart from this, Payra and Rampal power plants will have to pay $86 million in March and $140 million in June.
The loan installments of eight centers of PDB have to be paid for January $24.80 million, February $18.30 million, March $17.19 million, April $17.15 million, May $6.37 million and June $31.16 million. In addition, the January bill for the purchase of equipment for PDB’s own power plants is $13.60 million. A total of $60 million will be paid in $15 million installments from February to May and $25 million in June.
When asked to know, several senior officials of PDB said on condition of anonymity that power generation has been disrupted since the last financial year due to inability to import coal, fuel oil and gas (LNG) due to dollar crisis. That is why load shedding is happening regularly. However, if the outstanding bills are not paid quickly, the power supply situation may worsen in the future. The matter has been informed to the ministry.