The Export-Import Bank of China signed an agreement with the Pakistani government to provide $448 million for construction of the 969 MW Neelum Jhelum hydropower project.
The project is being developed by Pakistan‘s Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA), which said it hopes to complete the Neelum Jhelum plant by 2016, according to HydroWorld.com.
WAPDA said more than 50 percent of the project’s 40 miles of tunnel have been excavated, while digging on the underground powerhouse and transformer hall are about 75 percent and 95 percent complete, respectively.
The project is being built along the Neelum River, making it part of an international dispute as India’s National Hydroelectric Power Corp. is developing its own project — the 330-MW Kishanganga — along the same river.
International treaty stipulates that the country that completes its project first has priority rights to the river’s waters, though the Permanent Court of Arbitration upheld India’s right to divert water from the Neelum in February.
