The country recorded the first system collapse on January 3, 2019 because of sharp frequency drop from 50.16Hz to 45.16Hz. This happened when Osogbo/Ihovbor 330Kv line tripped off at Osogbo Transmission Station and a few others at Jebba, Ajaokuta, Shiroro and Ugwuaji transmission stations followed.
This situation as usual resulted in blackout in most parts of the country before normalcy was restored.
This implies that the transmission infrastructure is still very weak and are not as reliable as the public is made to believe.
Babatunde Raji Fashola, minister of Power, Works and Housing, has consistently said that the transmission infrastructure can now wheel 7000 MW of electricity. This is yet to be tested as the last time the country was about to hit the 5,222MW mark was in 18 December 2017.
The country is still grappling with lack of steady power supply which the government has blamed on insufficient gas supply. Some oil and gas operators have countered this claim, stating rather that there is enough gas but that it is not being picked by generation stations who in turn are blaming the distribution companies who reject power supply to them to avoid incurring more debts from the generation companies.
According to a report from the presidency on January 4, 2019, about 1,814.83 MW was not generated due to unavailability of gas. This is against 1,728 MW not generated on the January 3, 2019 for the same reason. On January 2, the power plants were not able to generate 1,908MW even though the amount of power sent out was 4,034 MWH/Hour which was higher than the previous days.
Except for January 4, when 1,123 MW was not generated due to high frequency resulting from unavailability of distribution infrastructure, the figures for the previous days for the same reason were 1,476 MW for January 3 and 1,449 MW could not be generated.
The minister recently said that the private sector should be blamed for the poor performance of the power generation and distribution companies.
Reacting to the minister’s position, generation companies refuted the claims, saying they have exceeded contractual obligations set by the Bureau of Public Enterprises, (BPE).
Joy Ogaji, executive secretary, Association of Power Generation Companies, argued that it had scaled through despite challenges in the power sector. “GENCOs despite the stern challenges they are faced with from inception till date, have in association with the above FGN objective, kept to the terms of the industry agreements they entered into with the BPE, which defines the relationship between the privatised companies and the government (Represented by BPE and Ministry of Finance incorporated, MOFI), with a five year period to recover lost capacities.
“Records from BPE show that as at the takeover date, in November 2013, available generation capacity was 4,500MW. Also, installed generation capacity currently stands at 13, 496MW as against 12, 500MW at takeover. GENCOs engaged on a massive capacity recovery plan with their acquired assets and achieved in no time lost capacities, increasing available capacity to 7, 913MW.
Olusola Bello
