BEIRUT - In an interview with Daily Star newspaper, an energy expert said that Lebanon would continue to suffer severe power outages for many years if the government fails to find alternatives to costly fuel oil. 

"I don't think we will receive the promised electricity and natural gas from Egypt any time soon because Jordan and Syria have not completed the installations of the high voltage lines and pipelines," Chafic Abi Said, the former director of research at Electricite du Liban (EDL), told The Daily Star. 

Egypt was supposed to supply Lebanon between 150 MW and 450 MW of electricity in September, but the plan has been delayed by the Egyptians without any explanation.
Egypt also announced that gas deliveries scheduled to begin this month would be delayed to January 2008. 

Chafic Abi Said explained that Lebanon cannot wait indefinitely for natural gas and electricity from Egypt and proposed instead buying Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) from Qatar or Algeria.
"We are talking about an investment of nearly $200 million only to build terminals to receive LNG from tankers. The government could have built these terminals three years ago instead of wasting all that time," Said added. 

According to him LNG would reduce the energy bill by 30 percent but added that Lebanon still needed to build more power plants to meet growing demand. 

At present, Lebanon spends close to $1.5 billion each year to cover the losses of EDL.