OpeOluwani Akintayo
03 February 2018, Sweetcrude, Lagos — Nigeria’s power generating capacity fell to 5.0 Megawatts on January 2 this year, data obtained from the Nigeria Electricity System Operator, NESO, an arm of the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN showed.
The drop which was the first occurrence in the year was due to a system collapse.
Nigeria officially generates 5000MW until December 2017 when the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, said at the monthly power meeting that the national grid now generates 7000MW, adding that 2000MW out of the figure is hanging due to the inadequate transmission system.
However, as at January 1 this year, total power generation was pegged at 3, 667.5MW.
The second system collapse occurred on January 3 with an addition of just 1MW to 50MW from the previous day- making it 51MW.
However, power generation jumped much higher to 2,660.1MW on Jan. 4.
On January 5, the grid collapsed again, dragging capacity to 107MW.
Then on January 6, 7 and 8, the country’s power generation capacity was pegged at 173MW, 164.2MW and 72MW, respectively.
Peak power generation from January 1-8 was between 3,707.2MW and 4,982.7MW.
A total of 2,596.2MW was generated on January 27 due to gas constraint, while lowest generation as at Jan. 31 was 3, 673.30MW and peak generation, 4, 699.90MW.
It would be recalled that recently, Chief Executive Officer, TCN, Usman Mohammed, said the grid needs to be “stabilised”, adding that the solution lies in building another line between Benin and Omotosho.
He attributed 70 percent of power instability in the country to the hiccups being experienced between Lagos and Benin due to the presence of too many generation stations on the axis.How Nigeria’s power generation capacity crashed to 5MW in one day