The fifth meeting of Bangladesh-Nepal Joint Steering Committee regarding cooperation in power sector was held at the administrative building of 1,320MW power plant in Patuakhali's Payra on Tuesday.
In the joint steering committee meeting, Md Habibur Rahman, secretary of Power Division on behalf of Bangladesh and Dinesh Kumar Ghimire, secretary of power, water resources and irrigation ministry on behalf of Nepal, led the delegation of their respective countries.
The steering committee meeting discussed in detail the construction of hydropower plants in Nepal under joint investment of Bangladesh and Nepal, import of electricity from Nepal using existing interconnection grid lines over India and construction of new transmission lines.
The meeting expressed that as part of the new transmission line to be constructed exclusively within the territory of India, the matter will be determined through the Bangladesh-India-Nepal tripartite agreement.
Besides, investment in hydropower plants in Nepal and possibility of construction of inter-country dedicated transmission line for direct power connection between Bangladesh and Nepal was also reviewed.
At the same time, the meeting also discussed the private sector investment of Bangladesh in power generation in Nepal.
The meeting discussed the signing of an agreement on the import of 500MW of electricity from the 900MW upper Karnali hydropower plant to be implemented in Nepal by India's GMR Group.
The meeting reviewed the issues of cooperation between the two countries in exchange of experience, knowledge and expertise in the expansion of renewable energy in Bangladesh and Nepal.
The experience of solar home system activities and net metering activities of Bangladesh was highlighted in the meeting.
In the meeting, both countries agreed to take up capacity building activities in the power sector. During this time, details of the training capacity of Bangladesh Power Management Institute (BPMI) were highlighted from the side of Bangladesh.
Bilateral capacity building initiatives and trilateral agreements between Bangladesh-India and Nepal were also discussed.
The 5th meeting of the Bangladesh-Nepal Joint Working Group was held on Monday at the same venue.
It is to be noted that the 4th meeting of Bangladesh-Nepal Joint Steering Committee and Joint Working Group regarding cooperation in power sector was held in Nepal last year.
The next 6th meeting of the committee is scheduled to be held in Nepal in November 2023.
