Save energy, save Pakistan.

Before reading this article, we must inculcate in our minds the ownership of our beloved motherland, Pakistan. Everybody knows that our country has been facing severe energy crisis especially electricity crisis since long. Failure to overcome this crisis is mainly due to the fact that public shows least interest in cooperation with Government efforts. Governments have been adopting two-pronged strategy to tackle the issue. Number one, by producing more electricity and number two, by saving the electricity and its optimum utilization. As the first strategy i.e by producing more electricity, Governments have had different options like, producing cheap electricity from hydel power, nuclear power, wind energy, solar energy, and producing the costly electricity through fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal. The cheapest source of hydel electricity through construction of big dams especially Kala Bagh dam is resisted by people on the political basis. The other cheap sources of energy like wind energy and solar energy are relatively new concepts in the market and are now slowly gaining the popularity. Therefore, the Government is left with the choice of producing most of the electricity by the use of costly fossil fuels i.e. oil, gas & coal. Use of oil, gas and coal besides being costly, is also contributing heavily towards environmental Pollution.

The second strategy of Governments to overcome the crisis is by saving electricity but this strategy is always sabotaged due to least cooperation rather resistance from the public and resistance from the opposition parties. For example, people have always been resisting the policies of Governments to close the markets early in the evening, and they keep on wasting electricity in the night instead of utilizing whole day light. People are in habit of opening their businesses late in the morning, hence wasting one third or even half of the day light and then by keeping their shops/businesses opened till midnight they waste a huge amount of electricity for making their shops attractive with the help of hundreds of bulbs and tube lights. In addition to wasting costly electricity, people deteriorate their health and family relations due to their abnormal eating and sleeping habits during un-natural timings.  People are also very careless in switching off the spare lights in their offices, shops, workplaces and even in their houses. In hundreds and thousands Government buildings, electric appliances such as lights, fans and air conditioners are used lavishly during the office hours and even after the office hours. Resultantly millions of units of electricity are wasted on daily basis and Government has to pay Billions of dollars of Foreign exchange against the import bill of Oil & Gas for production of electricity to meet the otherwise un-necessary demand of electricity. 

Therefore, to save energy and to save our beloved country certain measures are imperative to be taken which include but not limited to following suggestions,

① Construction of big and small water dams for production of cheap electricity keeping aside the political biases,

② Markets must be closed with the sun set with few exceptions of medical facilities and other essential services as being practised in developed countries. Restaurants and marriage halls may be allowed to remain open only up to 10.00 pm.

③ All TV Channels must close their telecast at 10.00 pm, so that people can develop a habit of going to bed early in the night and getting up early in the morning. There is no logic in watching the TV round-the-clock when most of the TV programs are available in the repeat-telecast during next day.

④ To save energy in the Government offices, one official should be assigned the exclusive duty of supervising the rational use of electricity and to check its wastage.

⑤ Civil engineers and scientists shall be assigned the task of developing such construction materials/designs which can keep the buildings cool or require least amount of electricity to cool them in the hot summers.

⑥ Use of cheap alternate and renewable energy should be encouraged and facilitated by the Government and NGOs.

 (7) Last but not the least, the people should realize the importance of Plantation. Everybody should plant trees and look after them for clean and cool environment.

More Suggestions should be welcomed to save energy and to make Pakistan safe and prosperous, for better quality of life of people living in this country.