Oct 08, 2019 (LBO) - Sri Lanka should have a dialogue among all the stakeholders as to how to move forward and create an efficient energy sector that ensures energy security, environment friendliness, a senior official said.
“The energy sector in Sri Lanka is sensitive to many factors,"
Prof. Kithsiri M. Liyanage, chairman of the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka said.
"If you look at some of which are perhaps bit unique to us and therefore the establishment of an efficient energy sector may require to deal with many salient challenges that we may not find elsewhere in the world."
In such backdrop, he says it will be quite useful and helpful to have a dialogue among all the stakeholders as to how we can move forward and create an efficient energy sector which ensures energy security, environment friendliness among many other things that we expect from today’s energy sector.
He made these comments at the recently held Energy Forum 2019, under the theme of “Policy Dialogue on Importance of Efficient Energy Sector for Economic and Investment Growth – Sri Lanka”.
The event was organised by the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL).
Sri Lanka has forecasted 4.5 percent annual growth of electricity demand in the next 20 years which needs the installed capacity to be increased up to 10,854 MW during the period.
The PUCSL says investment is the energy sector remains a key challenge in Sri Lanka which will affect economic growth.
"Having an efficient energy sector contribute economic and investment growth of Sri Lanka in larger scale,"
"Proper policy and strong regulatory mechanism will play a major role in attracting investment."
The Forum focused on discussing the solutions for challenges facing the sector and concluded with a panel discussion on the topic.
The panel was chaired by Saliya Wickramasuriya, former director general of Petroleum Resource Development Secretariat of Sri Lanka and members included Prof. Rohan Samarajiva - founding chair of LIRNEasia & chairman of Information and Communication Technology Agency, Dr. Pramod Deo – Former Chairperson of Central Electricity Regulatory Commission of India, Prof. Sirimal Abeyratne - Senior Professor, University of Colombo & the Chairman of Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka, Managala Yapa – Chairman of Board of Investment Dr. Nishan De Mel – Executive Director and Head of Research of Verité Research & Commissioner of PUCSL, .
More than 500 professionals representing public and private sector attended the event.
Among them were local and international business leaders, policymakers, experts, industrialists and government officials.
They discussed the investment challenges, barriers and opportunities in the electricity industry, investment trends in other parts of the world for electricity industry and impact of the efficient energy sector for economic and investment growth of the country at this year’s forum.