Consumers groan as system collapse worsens power supply

JUNE 21, 2013 BY DAYO OKETOLA

Electricity consumers have condemned the worsening power situation in the country and blamed the Power Holding Company of Nigeria for gross inefficiency.

They lamented that power supply had become poorer in recent times and warned that the situation was no longer acceptable, especially as they were still being forced to pay ‘crazy bills’ by PHCN.

The Chairman, Akoka Community Development Association in Lagos, Mr. Segun Adesanya, who spoke with our correspondent, bemoaned the poor power supply to his area, saying consumers barely enjoyed electricity for 20 minutes daily.

He explained that the situation had got worse in recent times, and urged PHCN to improve on the situation.

Adesanya said members of the CDA had concluded plans to protest at the Ikeja Distribution Company to drive home their displeasure about the poor power supply in the country.

The Assistant Secretary General, Tijani Bello Resident Association, Ojodu, Lagos, Ms. Murna Danmadami, also lambasted PHCN for poor power supply, saying the situation had gone from bad to worse.

“Poor power supply is disturbing our businesses, livelihood and our personal lives. You go out in the morning and work very hard, but when you come back home, you don’t have peace and quietness because of so many generators making a noise,” she said.

Mr. Adewunmi Oluwole, who lives at Ipaja Estate in Lagos, said power supply in his area had become poorer lately, adding that PHCN had resorted to load shedding amid irregular supply.

While consumers continue to groan, PHCN officials, who did not want to be named, attributed the situation to system collapse, which had become a regular occurrence in the power sector.

Contrary to the claims in government quarters that the country generates at least 4,500 megawatts of electricity daily, our correspondent gathered that the figure was significantly lower than that.

PHCN statistics showed that the last time the country generated 4,500MW of electricity was on December 23, 2012.

This means that all the power generation plants in the country have not generated up to 4,000MW since January 2013 due to consistent system collapse.

For instance, power generation dropped to 3,118.4MW on Sunday, June 16, 2013, though the peak demand forecast as of that day was 12,800MW.

This was 1,370MW lower than the highest peak generation of 4,517.6MW achieved on Sunday, December 23, 2012.

Generation picked up again on Monday, June 17, 2013 to 3,720.50MW, but dropped to 3,507.90MW the following day.

The country had, in the past five months, recorded more than 15 power system collapses.

“The high rate of system collapse in recent time, which has given rise to more than 15 collapses in the last five months, calls for a critical look,” the Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, said recently.

In view of this, the minister set up a 13-member Technical Investigative Panel on System Collapse to find the causes of the incessant collapse of electricity infrastructure across the country.

The country recorded a total of 24 system failures in 2012, with 15 being total and nine partial system collapses. It recorded 39 and 42 system failures in 2009 and 2010, respectively.

Power generation had dropped by 31,529MW in April, which was 33.9 per cent of the 4,517MW attained on December 21, 2012.

The Ministry of Power had attributed the sharp drop in supply to general system collapse.

Power generation had experienced a downward trend since December 17, 2012 when it dropped to 4,349.7MW amid fluctuating figures, finally declining to 2,987.6 on April 6, 2013.

Source
http://www.punchng.com/business/business-economy/consumers-groan-as-system-collapse-worsens-power-supply/

I think Chinedu Nebo is incompetent and is letting the crooks in that sector run rings around him. At least, Barth Nnaji was competent and we were making some progress.

his incompetency will tell Jonathan that he is incompetent.

That man thinks that he's dealing with his students UNN.

I Remember when some of us were praising Nnaji for little improvement we saw during his tenor, some people were cursing us & saying that it has always been like that every rainy season, So my question is this, What happened? are we not in rainy seasoning?

Power cuts worsen as generation drops by 1,598MW

JUNE 24, 2013 BY AKINPELU DADA

Power generation in the country dropped by 1,598 megawatts on Sunday, the Transmission Company of Nigeria said.

The company explained that the massive load shedding being experienced nationwide was caused by vandalism of two major gas pipelines supplying gas to eight power generating stations.

The affected stations are Egbin/AES, Olorunsogo, Omotoso, Geregu NIPP, Afam IV and VI as well as River State Independent Power Station, resulting in drastic reduction of power supply.

In a statement signed by the General Manager (Public Affairs), TCN, Mr. Dave Ifabiyi, the company said that one of the vandalised gas pipelines was taking supply from the Okoloma gas plant, while the other was taking from Escravos.

Ifabiyi said, “With the disruption of gas supply through the lines, the Nigerian Gas Company is unable to move gas to Afam IV and Afam VI as well as the Independent Power Plant in Rivers State, resulting in generation loss of 593MW.

“Also, the second vandalised gas pipeline from Escravos to Warri caused a cutback of 1,005MW in power generation from Egbin/AES power generating station, Olorunsogo, Omotosho and Geregu NIPP power generating plants.”

According to the statement, with the loss of 1,598MW, the total power generation as of 2pm on Sunday is 2,290MW.

With this low level generation, the company said the operation and control of the power system was a major challenge.

TCN said due to the critical importance of the pipelines to power generation, NGC was working seriously to isolate the vandalised portions of the pipelines in order to effect repairs, with the hope that gas supply could be restored to the affected generating stations soonest.

The company said it deeply regretted inconveniences the attendant load shedding was causing Nigerians nationwide.

Apart from gas supply shortage, the worsening power supply situation in the country had in recent times been blamed on frequent collapse of the generation and transmission systems.

Contrary to the claims in government quarters that the country was generating at least 4,500MW of electricity daily, it was gathered that the figure was significantly lower than that.

PHCN statistics showed that the last time the country generated 4,500MW of electricity was on December 23, 2012.

This means that all the power generation plants in the country have not generated up to 4,000MW since January 2013 due to consistent system collapse.

For instance, power generation had dropped to 3,118.4MW on June 16, 2013, though the peak demand forecast as of that day was 12,800MW.

This was 1,370MW lower than the highest peak generation of 4,517.6MW achieved on Sunday, December 23, 2012.

Generation picked up again on Monday, June 17, 2013 to 3,720.50MW, but dropped to 3,507.90MW the following day.

The country had, in the past five months, recorded more than 15 power system collapses.

“The high rate of system collapse in recent time, which has given rise to more than 15 collapses in the last five months, calls for a critical look,” the Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, said recently.

In view of this, the minister set up a 13-member Technical Investigative Panel on System Collapse to find the causes of the incessant collapse of electricity infrastructure across the country.

The country recorded a total of 24 system failures in 2012, with 15 being total and nine partial system collapses. It recorded 39 and 42 system failures in 2009 and 2010, respectively.

Power generation had dropped by 31,529MW in April, which was 33.9 per cent of the 4,517MW attained on December 21, 2012.

The Ministry of Power had attributed the sharp drop in supply to general system collapse.

Power generation had experienced a downward trend since December 17, 2012 when it dropped to 4,349.7MW amid fluctuating figures, finally declining to 2,987.6 on April 6, 2013.

Source:

http://www.punchng.com/business/business-economy/power-cuts-worsen-as-generation-drops-by-1598mw/

Expensive72: I Remember when some of us were praising Nnaji for little improvement we saw during his tenor, some people were cursing us & saying that it has always been like that every rainy season, So my question is this, What happened? are we not in rainy seasoning?

I remember one mumu that told me same here in NL too .. From the first day I saw the Nebu man I knew this one will just start sending his old children and grand children on shopping spree

Power Supply Remains Poor amid Concern of Higher Tariffs

Ejiofor Alike

Electricity supply across the country is yet to improve even as consumers are paying higher tariffs with fresh concern of further increase in line with the Multi-Year Tariff Order (MYTO), THISDAY has learnt.

This is coming as Marubeni Power International of Japan will soon complete the contract for the resuscitation of the Unit 6 of the 1,320megawatt-capacity Egbin Power Station in Lagos, to ensure that the station realises its full generation capacity.

THISDAY gathered that due to several system collapses, which damaged some transmission facilities, average supply in the past couple of weeks has not exceeded 3,437megawatts, even when the country had previously celebrated peak supply of 4,377megawatts.

This deteriorating electricity, it was learnt, is coming in the wake of recent increase in tariffs, with fixed charges going up from N500 to N700 or N800, depending on the location.

Apart from the recent increase in fixed charges, there is also plan to increase the energy cost or cost per kilowatt hour of electricity in line with MYTO, which requires that electricity charges will go up yearly from 2012 to 2016 until cost-reflective tariff is attained.

Meanwhile, the supply situation has remained poor in most places as there had been no significant improvement in generation.

THISDAY gathered generation, which averaged 3,000megwatts since 2007 had continued to hover around this figure, while there had been astronomical increase in the number of consumers.

Investigation revealed that some areas that enjoyed 12-hourly supply were now being provided with eight hours of supply.

A source at the National Control Centre (NCC) at Osogbo in Osun State told THISDAY at the weekend that with the dwindling supply, priority areas were always considered in allocating supply.

“There has been high demand and poor supply in recent weeks. So, we have to feed our priority areas before allocating to other areas. That accounts for the fluctuation being witnessed in some areas,” he said.

In a related development, Marubeni Power International of Japan is set to complete the repairs of the 220megawatt-capacity Unit 6 of the Egbin Power Station, which was awarded to it on December 19, 2013.

A source at the power plant told THISDAY that the Japanese firm was in the process of completing the job, which was initially scheduled to last for 90 days.

Before the contract was awarded, Units 1,2,3,4 and 5 were generating 994megawatts to the national grid, while the Unit 6’s Generator Rotor was being awaited.

Marubeni Engineering West Africa Limited had earlier completed the contract for the replacement of Unit 6’s automative voltage regulator (AVR) Thyristor panel, which completion date was initially scheduled for June 2011.

http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/power-supply-remains-poor-amid-concern-of-higher-tariffs/154099/

Power supply to Lagos drops by 67%

AUGUST 12, 2013 BY DAYO OKETOLA 8 COMMENTS

Power supply from the national grid to Lagos has dropped by 67 per cent.

The drop on Sunday followed a drastic reduction in power generation from 3,367.20MW on Friday to 2,628MW on Saturday.

Some officials of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, who spoke with our correspondent on Sunday but asked not to be named, said the Eko and Ikeja Distribution companies responsible for power supply to Lagos and its environs received an average electricity supply of 600MW from the national grid daily.

This, according to them, has been reduced by 67 per cent due to the crisis affecting some of the nation’s power plants.

Our correspondent gathered that the two distribution companies in Lagos got a little over 200MW each on Sunday.

When contacted, a senior official of the Ikeja Distribition Company, who also spoke under anonymity, confirmed that the DISCO, which normally received over 600MW from the national grid, was only supplied 226MW on Sunday.

He explained that this had been responsible for the latest load shedding in Lagos and warned that the situation could continue if generation did not improve.

The nation was thrown into massive load shedding and near black out on Saturday when power generation level dropped to 2,628.6 mega watts.

The Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, attributed the problem to the low gas supplied to the generation plants in the area.

The Special Assistant to the Minister on Media, Ms. Kande Daniel, said Afam IV, Afam VI power plants as well as Rivers Independent Power Plant were shut down on Friday night with a combined loss of 624MW due to gas issues.

She said, in a statement, that government had already set machinery in motion to reverse the situation.

Nebo is a minister by nepotism, not by his competence! The sad thing is that his people cannot see it, they only whine if it was someone else who is not ibo.

I was having similar thought until i watched him being interviewed recently in the AIT 90 MINUTES program.
Then i realised that he is not only competent but earned both his engineer,scientist and proffessor tag.
@Juan De Dios,gosh! this piece is misleading.

FG commits N70.2bn euro bond to gas infrastructure

AUGUST 19, 2013 BY OKECHUKWU NNODIM, ABUJA LEAVE A COMMENT

The Federal Government has announced the allocation of N70.2bn ($450m) for the improvement of gas infrastructure across the country.

This, it said, was aimed at addressing the gas supply problems, which have led to a sharp reduction in power generation in the country.

The Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, who disclosed this in Abuja, also stated that the Federal Government had sourced for additional $1.47bn from the World Bank, African Development Bank, French Development Bank and the Chinese EXIM Bank for the improvement of the electricity transmission infrastructure.

Nebo spoke on Friday when delegates from the Independent Power Producers Association of Nigeria visited the ministry.

The Federal Government had last Tuesday said the proceeds from the sale of the 10 National Independent Power Project plants, amounting to $1.6bn, would be used to finance the Transmission Company of Nigeria.

Nebo also said the ministers of Finance, Petroleum Resources and Power had met last week to deliberate on the gas supply problems.

He said, “Nigeria has enough gas; more than enough; but there are things that have to be put in place and part of this include the right pricing for domestic gas.

“Government is also trying to address gas infrastructure challenges. The first segment is the East-West axis. Government is putting in billions of naira to address that. The next is the South-North, South-South and the North axis. So, there is a gas master plan and soon, the issue of gas will be settled.”

On transmission, he said once the Federal Government effectively put the funds allocated for the TCN to use, the country would be able to transmit 10,000 megawatts of electricity.

Nebo said, “We might come up with 10,000MW and might be able to transmit all. That is why a huge sum of what is being realised as proceeds of the sale of the NIPP plants, about $1.6bn, has been set aside to finance transmission.

“In addition, the World Bank is funding (the transmission system) with $800m; the French Development Bank is funding with another $170m to aid transmission. When you look at this, we will say there is a huge investment going on for transmission. We hope with these, we will be able to produce the 10,000MW and at the same time wheel it out for full distribution. I forgot to mention the $500m we got from the Chinese EXIM Bank, still for transmission.”

The minister also said President Goodluck Jonathan had approved the inauguration of the Geometric Power Plant in Aba, Abia state.

He added that the government was working to make sure that the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trader was fully capitalised so as to ensure partial risk guarantee for the IPPs.