Khan Khwar Hydropower Plant

The Khan Khwar Hydropower Plant is a run-of-the-river project located near the town of Besham in the Shangla District of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. It is situated on the Khan Khwar River, a right bank tributary of the Indus River. It is approximately 265 km from the federal capital of Islamabad and 350 km from the provincial capital of Peshawar.

The total electricity generation capacity of the Khan Khwar project is 72 MW. There are two vertical Francis turbine units of 34 MW and one unit of 4 MW installed at the Khan Khwar Hydroelectric Station, with an average annual generation capacity of 595 million units (GWh) of cheap electricity. These turbines are manufactured by the Dongfang Electric Machinery Co. Ltd. The project was completed by the technical assistance of Chinese corporations (Sinohydro Corporation via a consortium with China Water Resources Beifang Investigation, Design and Research Co. Ltd).

Construction of the Khan Khwar Hydropower Plant commenced in April, 2003, and was completed in April, 2012. The power house commenced commercial operations in November, 2010. The project was officially inaugurated on the 14 July, 2012, by the then Prime Minister of Pakistan Raja Pervez Ashraf. The total cost of the project was about PKR 10.73 billion, out of which PKR 5.049 billion accounted for the foreign exchange component.

Dam: Type: RCC Length: 112 m. Height: 46 m. Design discharge: 29 cusecs Design head: 244 m.