The Gaza Electricity Distribution Company has restarted a number of its generators to provide limited, paid electricity to areas surrounding its headquarters, following months of power outages and extensive damage to the distribution network during the war.
اضافة اعلان
Mohammed Thabet, the company’s director of public relations and media, said the generators are operating only in areas surrounding the company’s headquarters and temporary offices. He explained that the primary objective is to secure electricity for employees, enabling them to continue their work and receive members of the public.
Thabet added that the company is also supplying part of the available power to surrounding areas, within its technical capabilities. He stressed that the initiative is “small and limited” and does not represent a return of the electricity grid or serve as a replacement for primary power sources.
The electricity supplied through the generators costs approximately 22 shekels per kilowatt-hour, a rate close to the cost of fuel and oil, compared with more than 30 shekels per kilowatt-hour charged by private generators.
Thabet emphasized that operating the generators is not a profit-making project, but rather a “temporary community intervention” aimed at easing the electricity crisis in areas the company is able to serve until primary power sources are restored and the distribution network is rehabilitated.
The move comes amid extensive damage to Gaza’s electricity sector. The Palestinian Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources and the Government Media Office have said that damage to electricity networks, transformers, and transmission and distribution facilities has exceeded 85%. The Strip’s only power plant has also been taken out of service, while large portions of solar energy systems have been destroyed.
According to a provisional damage assessment issued by the World Bank, the United Nations and the European Union, direct and indirect losses in the energy and electricity sector are estimated at more than $1.2 billion. The destruction of the system has deprived more than two million Palestinians of basic electricity supplies.
Source: Shehab News
