Pakistan’s first Supercritical coal power plant comprising 2 x 660 MW plant is a part of CPEC and is established to help alleviate Pakistan’s energy shortfall. An estimated 4.48 million tons of coal is required annually for the plant, based on a calculation of 22 hours of power generation per day. The rate of standard coal consumption for power generation (Gross) is 291.65g/kWh with an annual power generating capacity of 8976 GWh. The gross efficiency of the plant is 42.11% and the operating temperature of the supercritical steam generator is 580 oC. Air quality monitoring systems, flue gas desulphurisation, and electric precipitators have been installed to reduce the ash and Sulphur emissions from the plants.

Pakistan is a coal-rich country with coal reserves of 185 Billion Tonnes. For smooth operation of a plant, a reliable supply of coal from the fields is considered to be very important but for this case, the coal used for the power generations is being imported from Indonesia and South Africa and is transported by rail from the Port of Karachi and Port Qasim to plant’s site viz. Qadirabad, Sahiwal. Considering the security of its supply, it is not advisable that we keep on using imported coal. We must use our own local cheap resource. Some quarters say that the coal from Pakistan's own Thar coalfield is found to contain excessive amounts of sulfur and lime, and is not deemed to be of high enough quality for the project.

Without compromising the performance of power plant, assess the social and environmental and technical impacts (mining, transportation, utilization, carbon dioxide emissions, pollution, economy, etc.) on the people residing in the vicinity of this plant in general and whole globe in particular if the imported coal utilisation is switched with the local reserves for production of power. Suggest preventive and mitigation measures available.