Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) is vigorously carrying out feasibility studies and engineering designs of various hydropower projects with accumulative generation capacity of more than 25,000 MW and most of these studies are at the advance stage of their completion. Wapda Chairman Shakil Durrani said this while addressing a delegation of the 88th national management course here on Wednesday. Principal of National Management College, Lahore, Lieutenant General Javed Hassan (Retd) led the delegation. The Wapda Chairman, giving an overview of the water and power scenario, said the Wapda, after its bifurcation in October last year, was now more focused towards harnessing the water and hydropower resources in the country. Later, Wapda member (Water) Muhammad Mushtaq Chaudhry and Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco) Managing Director Munawar B. Ahmed briefed the delegation on water and power sectors respectively. He said per capita availability of water in Pakistan had reduced to an alarming level of 1,070 cubic meter in 2007 and if the storage capacity was not enhanced by building new water reservoirs, the country would have to face an acute shortage of water in 2012. He said Pakistan had been blessed with the ample resources of water, but could develop only 13 percent storage capacity of the annual water flows of its rivers, and that too was fast depleting due to sedimentation in the reservoirs of Tarbela, Mangla and Chashma. The delegation was told that the United States had developed 497 percent storage capacity of the annual flow of River Colorado. Likewise, Egypt possessed 281 percent storage capacity on River Nile and India 35 percent on Sutlej-Bias basin, he added. He said the increasing population and depleting storage capacity of the water reservoirs in Pakistan called for constructing more than one-mega dams without any further delay. Building just one mega water reservoir would be a replacement of the lost capacity of the existing reservoirs. It was further told that more than 20 million acres of virgin land could be irrigated provided additional water was made available by constructing new water reservoirs in Pakistan. The delegation was also briefed about the projects being executed by the Wapda in water and hydropower sectors. Later, Wapda Chairman Shakil Durrani and Pepco Managing Director responded to the various questions asked by the delegation. Souvenirs were also exchanged as memento to the visit. Copyright Business Recorder, 2008