BREAKING NEWS, Featured, Power
–
Nigerian Vice President Yemi Osinbajo raises hope the country will generate 7000 megawatts of electricity by the first quarter of 2017
| By Anayo Ezugwu | Nov 7, 2016 @ 01:00 GMT |
NIGERIA is hoping to increase its power generation capacity to 7000 megawatts by the first quarter of 2017. Power generation in the country averages 4154 megawatts in the last one month. Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, who acknowledged that the country was battling with 3,000 megawatts, assured that the 7,000mw is achievable.
Osinbajo based his hope on the fact that the federal government is currently working on nine transmission stations across the country. He, however, attributed the crisis in the power sector to the vandalisation of the Folcado terminal and four other export terminals.
According to him, the unending vandalism is responsible for the reduction in the megawatts to as low as 2500mw of power. The vice president, who said this in Abeokuta, while declaring open the eighth session of the National Council on Industry, Trade and Investment, added that the work on the critical transmissions would be completed by the first quarter of the year 2017.
Power generation for the period under review recorded a peak of about 4362mw on the October 12.
It should be recalled that the country’s power generation attained its peak of 5074.7mw and also the highest maximum daily energy wheeled nationwide of 109,372mw hour (mwh) on Tuesday, February 2.
The nation’s power grid recorded 21 collapses in the first half of the year, made up of 16 total collapses and five partial collapses. In the whole of 2015 and 2014, the grid collapsed 10 and 13 times, respectively, with four partial collapses each. This indicated a worsening power situation in 2016.
Also, electricity statistics obtained from both the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, and the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, indicated that electricity generated by the Generation Companies, GENCOs, for the first week of the month averaged 4133mw, which latter dropped to 4088mw the following week, while 4224mw was recorded on the third week.
The figures also showed that energy generated in megawatts per hour for the last three weeks averaged 85,726mwh, while energy sent out to the 11 distribution companies was 84,264mwh in the first week. It went up to 85,120mwh in the second week before rising to 87, 630mhw in the third week.
The lowest generation stood at 3,203mw in the first week, while 3,248mw and
3,401mw were recorded in the second and third week, respectively. Though the country installed capacity stands at 11,165.40mw, the country’s network operational capability remained 5,500mw. In spite of government’s efforts to increase electricity supply in the country, generation has continued to hover around 3,500mw and 4,000mw.
Babatunde Fashola, minister of power, works and housing, had on May 18, said the nation’s power sector has the capacity to generate 12,000mw of electricity. The minister said in spite of the challenges, the country’s power sector still possessed the capacity to advance its power generation, transmission and distribution potentials through other energy supply sources.
According to the minister, meeting that target has been difficult because only 70 out of the 140 turbines in the country have been able to get gas to work with.
|
Tags:
