Bangladesh decides to import electricity from India

The Bangladesh Government decided to import power from India in an agreed price to mitigate the internal demand.
The decision in this regard came at the regular weekly cabinet meeting at the Bangladesh Secretariat. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina presided over the 51st cabinet meeting. Ministers, State Ministers and Advisers to the Prime Minister, among others, were present.

"The Cabinet meeting approved the Memorandum of Understanding between Bangladesh and Indian governments on cooperation in power sector," Abul Kalam Azad, Press Secretary to the Prime Minister told at the conference room of the Press Information (PID) department.
The Cabinet also approved the amendment to the policy of increasing private participation -- 2008. It also gave final approval to make Small Enterprise Development Project a subsidiary company of Agrani Bank with a new name Agrani SSE Financing Company.

It also decided to set back the clock by an hour to the GMT-based original position as the Government decided to introduce variable timings for the summer and the rest of the year from 2010.
"… the clock will be pushed back to 10:59 pm after it ticks 11:59 pm to set the original timing position," Azad said.

It is mentioned that the power sector is reeling from severe crisis since no considerable power has been added anew to national grid in recent times. The daily production of power in the country is 4,000 MW against a demand for about 5,500 MW. Production of electricity in the public sector in the current year stood at about 4,300 MW per day against the daily demand for 7,000 MW, the concerned ministry sources said.
Finance Minister A.M.A. Muhith said that tenders for power projects to generate another 4,000-4,500 MW would all be floated in 2010.

Most of the power plants are run by gas. The country faces a shortage of up to 250 mm cf of gas a day as the reserves of gas depleting. As a result the government has temporarily closed down several fertiliser manufacturing plants to divert the natural gas they use to generate more electricity.
Frequent power failures cut the country's gross domestic product by around $ 1 bn annually. The country would need $ 1.5 bn annual investment for power generation, transmission and natural gas exploration.

Uninterrupted use of power depends on weather as power outage increases if temperature is low or it rains.
However, power outage starts if temperature is high.