20 February 2015, Abuja – The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, has issued two on-grid licences to KVK Power Nigeria PVT Limited and Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria Plc to generate electricity from solar and gas respectively.
According to the commission, both companies will generate a total of 590 megawatts of electricity when their plants become fully operational.
It said KVT Power would be located in Yabo, Sokoto State, adding that the firm had met the requirements for the grant of 50MW on-grid generation licence with no objection received from the general public to its application.
“The licence has thereby been issued,” the commission said in a statement made available to our correspondent on Thursday in Abuja.
It noted that in the same vein, ALSCON’s application for an on-grid electricity generation licence in respect of a 360MW gas-fired plant at Ikot Abasi, Akwa Ibom State and a permit in respect of a 180MW captive power generation in the same location were approved and issued.
The approval to ALSCON, according to NERC, is after the review of an objection to the licence issuance by the BFI Group was found not to affect the grant of the licence.
The Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, NERC, Dr. Sam Amadi, congratulated the two licensees for successfully going through the process leading to the issuance of the licences.
He was quoted to have said, “Our system is to ensure that whoever is licensed is able to carry the construction to completion. What we can tell the licensees is that we will support you in any way we can as you make progress.”
Amadi said that the commission would be available to assist the licensees when the need for Power Purchase Agreement arose.
The Chairman, KVK Nigeria, Mr. Abubakar Cika, commended the reforms of the government in the power sector.
He stated that it was unfortunate that there had been a lot of negative comments about the sector, stressing that “people failed to realise that Rome was not built in one day.”
Cika said that KVT would execute the project in collaboration with Indian partners.
The Managing Director, ALSCON, Dr. Oleg Suistunov, explained that it was difficult to generate power without a licence, adding that the licence was an important certificate that would enable investors to move to the next stage of power generation.
“Now, we can support our community, we can support Akwa Ibom in providing electricity,” he said.
NERC has so far issued four licences this year.
– Punch
