The federal government plans to introduce a transformer-level load shedding system under which electricity supply will be directly linked to bill recovery from consumers connected to each transformer.

Federal Minister for Energy Sardar Owais Leghari told the National Assembly on Tuesday that the new mechanism will replace the existing feeder-based load management system over the next year once technical and policy preparations are completed.

He said the government currently maintains zero load shedding on around 11,500 feeders across the country, but added that completely eliminating outages is not feasible due to rising financial losses in the power sector.

Under the proposed system, areas with low bill recovery rates will face increased load shedding, while neighborhoods with better payment compliance will receive improved electricity supply. The minister said the aim is to make power distribution more targeted and financially sustainable, rather than applying blanket outages across entire feeders.

Owais Leghari also acknowledged ongoing power shortages in parts of the country, noting that even his own constituency is currently experiencing up to 18 hours of load shedding on five feeders.

Pakistan’s power sector has traditionally used feeder-based load shedding, where entire areas face outages depending on recovery rates and technical losses. However, officials argue that shifting to a transformer-level approach will allow more precise enforcement and reduce complaints from paying consumers who are often affected due to poor recovery in their wider feeder areas.

The reform comes as the government faces mounting pressure to reduce circular debt and improve electricity bill recovery under broader energy sector restructuring commitments linked to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).