Economic and Social activities of the people of Bayelsa State is to be boosted as 41 megawatts Power plants being built in Yeneoga, Bayelsa state by ENI, the Italian oil giant for the purpose of serving state.
This is expected to help contribute to the Federal Government efforts at strengthening power supply across the country as whatever is unused by the state would be transferred to the national grid
Though the cost of the plants was not disclosed the first phases of the projects which is 10 megawatts will be commissioned by May this year. Work will start on the second phase which is 25 megawatts almost immediately and thereafter it would be scaled up to 41 megawatts
A power industry source has disclosed to BusinessDay on the sideline of the ongoing West African International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (WAIPEC) taking place in Lagos.
The state has largest gas reserve in the country but despite this power supply in the state has been epileptic.
About two- third of the of the power plants in Nigeria depend on gas for generating electricity.
This may also reduce the cost of living in the sates as most residential and commercial activities depend on private generators to power their activities.
To achieve this, a special purpose vehicle has been created between the Bayelsa state government and Eni which is Bayelsa Electricity Company which will take over the operations of the plants.
When the first phase of the project is commissioned it is expected that the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board would take between 2 to 3 megawatts of electricity to power 17 story headquarter office situated in state capital.
The company, Eni is also billed complete the over 400megawatts okpai power plant, in Delta State which will bring the total generating capacity of the plant to a little about 1000 mw in July this year.
Recently, Usman Muhammed, managing director of Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) stated that Bayelsa State was on the verge of achieving stable power supply
He said through the work that the governor has done, Bayelsa is now connected to national grid.
“We just concluded 90 MVA; the former capacity was 30MVA, which means we have increased the capacity by 300 percent of what it used to be. “
According to him TCN have provided another 40MVA just as it is looking at how to collaborate with the state government to install that 40MVA.
In spite of claims of huge investments to improve power supply in all local government areas of Bayelsa State, residents have decried the poor power supply in the state.
The State Commissioner for Power, Ogbolo Jim, ahad course to disclose that the state government had invested over N2 billion to improve power supply.
He explained that the government had carried out a lot of projects in effort to boost electricity supply. The government have carried out the construction and rehabilitation of 48 electrical projects within the six years in office.
Olusola Bello
