According to them, most of the ministries and divisions have been asked to curtail fund from their “insignificant projects” as much as possible to help the government move to mobilize fund for the Padma Bridge project.
The government plans to build Padma Bridge with the country’s own funds. As part of the plan, the Finance ministry will keep an allocation of Tk 5,000 crore for the bridge project.
“We’re scrutinizing every project of different ministries before allocating funds in the coming budget keeping in mind the fund mibilisation for the Padma Bridge,” said a senior official at the Finance Ministry, preferring anonymity.
Under the government’s plan, possibly the renewable energy sector will not getting any block allocation in the new budget, he said.
Last year, there was a block allocation of about Tk 200 crore for renewable energy particularly those of solar system. There is a provision that different ministries like LGED, Railway Division, Health Ministry, and Power Division can take this fund to implement their own solar power projects.
Under a government plan to increase the renewable energy’s share in electricity generation to 5 percent from existing one percent, the Power Division set a target to generate 500 MW of power from solar system by 2015.
At present, about 70-80 MW of power is being generated using solar system while the country’s total power generation is about 6,500 MW.
As part of the policies, different ministries were asked to implement projects to introduce solar power system at different institutions.
Among the ministries, the Railway Division was asked to install solar system at different railway stations while Prime Minister’s Office is supposed to implement a project on solar electrification at Union Information Services Centers.
The city corporations and municipalities under the LGRD Ministry have been asked to take projects for street lighting with solar LED system.
The Health Ministry is supposed to implement projects for solar electrification in rural health centers while the Education Ministry will take projects for solar electrification in remote education centers including schools, collages and madrasas.
In the same way, the Religious Affairs Ministry is responsible to install solar power in mosques.
Finance and Power Ministry officials said that progress in these solar projects is slow. But if the government really cuts block allocation for renewable energy, it will further slow down the solar power growth.
“As a result, the government target regarding solar power will not be achieved in the coming years,” said a top official at the Power Ministry who is dealing with renewable energy issues.