Four Years and Billions of Dollars Later, Baghdad Still has Intermittent Electricity

Despite years of work and billions of dollars spent trying to repair Iraq's decrepit electricity system, Baghdad's power supply remains intermittent and well below pre-war levels.

Baghdad in the first week in October averaged six hours of electricity per day, half as much as the rest of the country, according to the United States State Department. The capital's residents have become almost entirely dependent on expensive private generators to light their homes and run basic appliances such as refrigerators.

Iraq's electricity grid nearly collapsed this summer and the shortages were the worst since the summer of 2003, reported the ministry of electricity, and some Baghdad neighbourhoods have had only a few hours of power a day. The capital's power supply is "woefully inadequate", US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker told American lawmakers in September.

Baghdad had 16 to 24 hours of power daily in March 2003. Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein directed the lion's share of the country's electricity supply to the capital, leaving other areas short.

US and Iraqi authorities have tried to repair the power systems and equalise electricity distribution in Iraq. But as demand has increased for electricity, violence, corruption and mismanagement have hindered years of efforts to improve the power supply - particularly in the capital - and have weakened Iraqi confidence in their government.

"Every year, the ministry announces emergency plans and projects … but the power doesn't improve," said Ziyad Mahmood Ahmed, a 35-year-old civil servant from Baghdad's Dora district. "On the contrary, electricity was even bad in winter this year. There are areas in Baghdad that had power cuts for more than ten days."

The US inherited a shoddier power system than it had predicted after overthrowing former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in April 2003. US military air strikes badly damaged Iraq's power plants in 1991, and its infrastructure crumbled further under United Nations-imposed sanctions.

Washington has allocated over 4.6 billion US dollars, or about one-quarter of its Iraq reconstruction budget, for power projects since 2003. Yet only 57 per cent of Iraq's demand is being met, and the country as a whole has fewer hours of power daily than it did in the spring of 2004. The ministry of electricity estimates it will cost 27 billion dollars to repair and build infrastructure through 2015.

Just under 5,000 megawatts of power was produced per day in September, while the pre-war level was about 4,300 megawatts. The US Coalition Provisional Authority aimed to have 6,000 megawatts per day by July 2004, but that goal has never been met. The ministry reports that Iraq needs 8,250 megawatts per day, as demand for power has increased substantially since 2003 when Iraq was impoverished and under sanctions.

Insurgents regularly target both Iraq's oil-reliant electricity systems and its oil infrastructure, crippling both. About 2,500 megawatts are lost per day because of attacks on power transmission towers and distribution infrastructure, as well as fuel and water shortages, according to a September report by the US government's Energy Information Administration.

According to the Energy Information Administration, 78 per cent of Iraq's electricity stations are powered by resources such as gas and oil, while 22 per cent are hydro powered. Iraq's oil-dependent electricity infrastructure is problematic because of the country's fuel shortages, argued Abdul Ilah Sadiq, an adviser at the oil ministry.

"These two problems are interconnected," said Sadiq. "Refineries only operate with electricity and power stations only operate with oil products."

Oil smuggling has become a big business in Iraq, causing shortages that force the government to import oil and gasoline from countries such as neighbouring Iran and Turkey. The US Iraq Study Group estimated that Iraq loses at least 150,000 to 200,000 of the 2.3 million barrels of oil produced each day to smuggling.