For Managing Director of Nepal Electricity Authority Kul Man Ghising, every moment matters. From managing financial crunch faced due to industrial lockdown and decrease of supply to complete the transmission lines and ongoing power projects, MD Ghising has issue after issue to handle.

He has been going from place to place and sector to sector to supply interrupted quality electricity to consumers. MD Ghising has shown that if there is a will, there is a way. After successfully ending 20 years of load shedding and completing a number of transmission lines, Ghising is now moving with an objective to make electricity supply qualitative, reliable and cheaper.

With the backing of Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Barshaman Pun, MD Ghising is now working to raise fund to start the construction of Dudhkosi Storage Hydropower project.

As Nepal government’s current policies and program give high importance to the project, MD Ghising has already started meeting with Nepal’s bilateral donor partners.

International Economic Cooperation Coordination Division and Nepal Electricity Authority have started discussions with Nepal’s multilateral development partners for the financial support to construct 635 MW Dudhkosi Storage Project.

They held a preliminary discussion with the representatives of interested parties like Asian Development Bank, European Investment Bank, Asian Infrastructure Development Bank and Korean Exim Bank.

In the meeting, the head of division Shree Krishna Nepal and Managing Director of Nepal Electricity Authority Kul Man Ghising spoke on various aspects of the project with the development partners.

Division chief Nepal said that the construction of storage project is the priority of Nepal and Dudhkosi Storage Project is comparatively attractive and cheaper. He urged development partners to invest in the project.

During the discussion MD Ghising presented the current status of the project, importance of the storage project, cost and structure of investment. MD Ghising said that the bank’s representatives expressed their preliminary consent and requested concrete proposal through Ministry of Finance.

During the meeting ADB offered up to $555 million dollar and EIB $550, AIIB $300 million and ADB’s Private Sector Investment Mechanism up to $200-300 million. MD Ghising said that it can completely invest in one of the sectors out of Hydromechanical, Electromechanical or Transmission.

The government in its policies and programs announced the start of the construction of the project giving priority. Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Barshaman Pun announced implementation of Dudhkosi project as a national priority project during his visit to project site in December.

According to a study of JICA, this is one of the 10 best projects of Kosi basin. According to an initial estimate, the cost of the project is 1.53 billion dollar (160 billion rupees). However, the total cost of the project will reach 2 billion dollar including the interest and taxes.

Asian Development Bank will take the lead of the project. Under the grant assistance of ADB, the detailed project design is currently underway. MD Ghising said that the construction of the project needs to start soon to maintain balance in power supply in the country and to export remaining power to the neighboring country. He said that the DPR is now in the final stage. Out of the storage projects in Nepal, Dudhkosi is comparatively cheap and attractive due to energy generation. He said that we have conveyed these facts to the representatives.

The project will generate 3,44,3000000 units of energy. Out of this, 135800000 units during the winter and remaining in summer. The electricity generated by the project will be evacuated to national grid through Sunkosi-Dhalkebar 400 kV transmission line.

The project will submerge 3876 hectares of land of Khotang, Okhaldhunga and Solukhumbu districts. Although this is a storage project only 162 households of families will be evicted from the areas. Similarly, 988 families will be partially affected. The land of 1050 families will be submerged in the project.

A 220-meter dam will be built to create storage which will expand 17 kilometre in Dudhkosi, 8 kilometre in Rawa River, 5, 5 kilometre in Thotne Khola. The water will be discharged through 13.30 kilometre tunnel to powerhouse. The road to the project site is almost ready now.

For MD Ghising, the focus now is to manage the necessary fund for Dudhkosi Storage Project because this is cheaper and close to the load center.