India, Nepal, Bangladesh ink pact to facilitate cross-border electricity trade

Kathmandu, Oct 3 (IANS) In the first such cross-border energy trade pact, a long-awaited tripartite power sales agreement (PSA) among India, Nepal and Bangladesh was signed on Thursday here.

As part of the tripartite agreement, Nepal will export 40 MW electricity to Bangladesh via the Indian grid in the first phase — from June 15 to November 15.

India will make arrangements to supply electricity from Nepal to Bangladesh, it was announced during the meeting.

The tripartite PSA was signed between the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA), the Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) and NTPC Limited, India’s leading power generation company.

The route of electricity export from Nepal to Bangladesh has now been officially opened with this trade pact. Nepal has been exporting electricity to India for three years.

The agreement was signed in the presence of Nepal’s Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation, Dipak Khadka; Bangladesh’s Forest, Environment, Climate Change and Water Resources Minister Syeda Rizwana Hasan; and Indian Ambassador to Nepal Naveen Srivastava.

As per the NEA officials, the rate per unit of electricity has been fixed at 6.4 cents. From the export of electricity, Nepal will make an annual income of around $9.2 million, as per reports. The electricity will be exported to Bangladesh via the Dhalkebar-Muzaffarpur 400 kV transmission line, with the metering point in Muzaffarpur. In December last year, Bangladesh’s Cabinet Economic Affairs Committee had approved the import of 40 megawatts of electricity from Nepal. The pact was earlier scheduled to be signed in July but was postponed due to political turmoil and a change of government in Bangladesh.

–IANS

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