Our working relationship with risk is like reading classic novels: we claim to have read them at social interactions, but few of us are willing to go through the pain of actually reading them. And while we take the risk of being hit by a car when we walk across a busy intersection, we tend to be very risk-averse in a corporate setting.
In our everyday work, we do assume some small risks, by design or dictated by circumstances, with the same result — whether we like it or not, we like to brag about it when our little gamble produces more than the expected benefits. That’s exactly what happened this week with our team.
The challenge at hand is rehabilitating a 40-year-old hydropower station in Toktogul, Kyrgyz Republic. The 1,200-megawatt station has been producing more than 30 percent of the country’s electricity since early 1970s, bringing heat and light to citizens continuously during the winter. Life without Toktogul is unimaginable for those citizens.
About the author
Sohail Hasnie
Sohail Hasnie is a principal energy specialist with the Asian Development Bank. A firm believer that the solution to climate change lies in new technology, he has applied new technology to ADB projects in several Asian countries. Before joining ADB, Sohail worked for the state power utility and independent regulator in Melbourne, Australia.
