KARACHI: The World Bank's Independent Evaluation Group has rated the outcome of the $93.1 million Sindh Solar Energy Project "moderately unsatisfactory" because none of the three utility-scale solar plants started under the project was completed by its July 2025 closing date.
In its Implementation Completion Report Review, the IEG said the project originally targeted 400 megawatts of utility-scale solar generation and 20 MW of distributed solar capacity. It delivered only 35 MW of solar generation capacity.
The review blamed the failure to finish the utility-scale plants on delays in land allocation and grid approvals, weak coordination among provincial and federal authorities, and procurement and institutional capacity constraints.
Three sites, no completed plants
The project prepared three solar park sites: 120 MW at Deh Halkani and Ban Murad in Karachi, 150 MW at Deh Mitaghar in Karachi, and 50 MW at Manjhand in Jamshoro.
None was fully built by project closure. Private developers were competitively selected and civil works began at the two Karachi sites, but implementation later stalled. The Manjhand project never reached bidding because of delays in grid approvals and was eventually dropped.
The IEG also questioned the project's results framework. It said the original indicator, "generation capacity of energy constructed or rehabilitated," did not fully match the project's intended contribution of creating conditions for private investment in solar power.
Even under an alternative measure of "generation capacity enabled," the capacity initiated across the three plants totaled only 320 MW, short of the 400 MW target, the IEG said.
Rooftop solar exceeds target
Distributed solar performed considerably better. The project installed 35 MW of rooftop solar photovoltaic systems on public buildings against a 20 MW target, exceeding it by 75 percent. It also supported solar installations at 33 priority healthcare facilities and installed battery storage at public facilities affected by load-shedding.
The project provided new or improved electricity access to 1,010,598 people, about 84 percent of its original target of 1.2 million.
It substantially exceeded its gender-related target, reaching 76,241 female-headed households against an appraisal target of 4,000. The IEG attributed the result partly to subsidies being directed to the most vulnerable households, many of which were headed by women.
Delays and funding shortfalls
The World Bank approved the project in June 2018, and it became effective in June 2019. Its original closing date of September 2023 was extended by about 22 months to July 2025 because of limited project management capacity, procurement challenges and the Covid-19 pandemic.
The project cost was initially estimated at $105 million, including a $100 million credit from the International Development Association and $5 million in counterpart financing from the Sindh government. Exchange-rate depreciation reduced available World Bank financing to about $93 million, while Sindh provided only $2 million of its $5 million commitment.
The IEG rated the project's efficacy and efficiency as "modest." Despite the implementation shortcomings, it estimated the economic internal rate of return at completion at 29.8 percent, with an economic net present value of $278.3 million.
The review stressed the need for explicit federal-provincial coordination mechanisms in future sub-national energy projects, particularly where grid approvals and other federal responsibilities are critical to implementation.
