The construction work of 439 MW Betan Karnali Semi-reservoir Project, which is being constructed under leadership of the Employees Provident Fund (EPF), is all set to start from next year.

According to Betan Karnali Depositors Hydropower Limited (BKDHL), a subsidiary of the EPF, the civil work of the project will start from 2023 end. For the purpose, the company has publicly called for a ‘Letter of Intent’ to select an international consultant for the project’s supervision.

Manager of the BKDHL Deepak Rauniyar said they will call for a global tender to appoint a consultant following which they will go into bidding to hire a contractor. The project is expected to be completed by 2028.

The Detailed Project Report (DPR) prepared by NEA Engineering Company shows that the cost incurred for the construction will be Rs 74 billion, while it will increase up to Rs 88 billion in addition to the banks’ interest rate. Rauniyar said there may be some variation in costs due to inflation and rise in price of the US dollar.

The project is estimated to produce a total of 2.40 million units of electricity annually. It is projected to fetch an earning of Rs 14.50 billion in the first year while the annual revenue will go up to Rs 18.37 billion after nine years of production.

Global IME Bank will be leading the banks’ consortium to fund the project. Sunrise Bank and Nepal Infrastructure Bank will be other financing partners for the project. These banks will be investing a total of Rs 54 billion.

The issued capital of BKDHL is Rs 20 billion and its paid up capital is Rs 10 billion. The EPF has assigned 40 percent shares of the project to its 600,000 depositors. According to the EPF, it will be investing Rs 8.40 billion of its depositors in the project construction.

The EPF will hold 15 percent of the project’s equity shares, while Nepal Electricity Authority will have 10 percent, Electricity Production Company Limited will have 10 percent and an additional 13 percent will be generated by issuing primary shares to general people.

Likewise, two percent of the equity will be allocated to people from deprived communities and 10 percent will be provided to people affected by the project. The electricity produced by BKDHL will be evacuated through a 400 kV transmission line to be constructed by National Transmission Grid Company Limited.