United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Mission Director to Pakistan, Greg Gottlieb, presented the power distribution companies PESCO and IESCO with tools and maintenance vehicles at a ceremony at Rawal Grid Station in Islamabad. The event also marked the start of the second stage of Live Line Maintenance training for crews from power distribution companies throughout Pakistan.  USAID’s Energy Policy Program (EPP) is providing the training, tools, and vehicles to enhance the capacity of PESCO and IESCO to work on live power lines.

This initiative is part of the U.S. Government’s commitment to support the Government of Pakistan in making improvements in the energy sector.  With the training and equipment provided, all of Pakistan’s power distribution companies will have the training and resources necessary for crews to perform tests and maintenance on live power lines without shutting them down.  This will result in increased energy availability and reliability.

Jim Hicks, Chief of Party of EPP, representatives of the Ministry of Water and Power, the National Transmission and Dispatch Company (NTDC), and CEOs of several power distribution companies joined Mission Director Gottlieb at the event.  During his remarks, Gottlieb stated, “Through efforts like this, undertaken in partnership with the Government of Pakistan, USAID is helping to increase the reliability of power transmission.  These efforts are part of a broad U.S. government energy sector assistance program for Pakistan which is increasing access to reliable electricity for approximately 16 million people over a five year period.”

As part of the U.S. government energy sector assistance program, USAID has funded renovations at Tarbela, Jamshoro, Mangla, Guddu, and Muzzafargharh power plants, aided the completion of Gomal Zam and Satpara dams, and helped improve power distribution throughout Pakistan.  These efforts have already added more than 1000 megawatts of power to Pakistan’s power system. By the end of 2014, these efforts are expected to add a cumulative total of 1400 megawatts to Pakistan's power system.