I read an article and posted the link below for review and discussions. The article is titled "Why does Nigeria export Power when it continuously struggles to meet its Power Demands at Home?"

http://laselle-engineering..ca/2013/09/why-does-nigeria-export-power-when-it.html

Good article. It is stunning that we constructed a 70km, 330kV transmission line from Nigeria to Republic of Benin for the sole purpose of exporting power to Benin. One would have thought that we would be importing power to support our generation shortfall.

I copied part of the article below. The rest of the article and be found in the link below:

http://laselle-engineering..ca/2013/09/why-does-nigeria-export-power-when-it.html


[b]Why does Nigeria export Power when it continuously struggles to meet its Power Demands at Home?
In 2007, Nigeria commissioned and energized a 70km, 330kV transmission line from Ikeja to Republic of Benin (CEB-NEPA project). 330kV is currently the highest voltage in the Nigerian transmission network. This line was part of a strategy driven by West African Power Pool (WAAP) to export power generated from Nigeria to Republic of Benin. At the time of commissioning, Nigeria was exporting 80MW of power and today, Nigeria is exporting an average of 200MW to republic of Benin [African Development Bank Group, May 20, 2013].

Nigeria does not have the capacity to generate and transmit the required power it needs to meet the demand of Nigerian consumers. The country generated an all-time record peak of 4.5GW and this was in December 2012. Ever since December last year, Nigeria has not been able to reach this record generation peak due to lack of adequate generation supply and limited capacity on the transmission network. The “Road Map for Power Sector Reform” in Nigeria specifies a rule of thumb of at least 1GW (1,000 megawatts) of electricity generation and consumption for every 1 million head of population for any developed industrial nation. Based on Nigeria’s population of 150 million people, we should be targeting to generate and transmit a minimum of 150 GW

It is very clear that we are realistically decades away from generating and transmitting power to match the demand of the true loads of Nigerian consumers. In fact, based on above, we are only generating and transmitting 3% of the total GW we should be targeting to generate and transmit based on our population.

Why did we invest in transmission facilities to export power to neighbouring countries? One would think that if we did invest in transmission facilities to cross international borders, this strategy would have been executed to enable Nigerians to import power for a short to midterm to meet the excessive generation supply shortfall in the country. When stable and reliable Power is available in Nigeria, plans to invest in the exportation of excess generated power can be examined. However, this is not the strategy that was adopted. Based on the installed facilities, Nigeria is a net exporter of Power to Republic of Benin and Niger.

Rather than investing in the engineering and constructing of transmission lines from Nigeria to Republic of Benin for power exports, we should have been investing in transmission lines and facilities to transmit and distribute any excess power generated by our power plants to major load centers in our country. According to the African Development Bank Group, the Ikeja transmission site from where power is exported has a capacity of 450MW and is the largest transmission site in Africa with a 330kV transmission network. Any excess power that could be transmitted from this site should have been to support the requirements of Nigerian consumers.

There is no logical reason why we invested in facilities to export power to neighbouring countries when we are not able to meet our own power demands. This was a bad decision made by our leaders. Nigerians need to pay closer attention to details to prevent decisions like this being made in the future.

Given the major generation supply and transmission capacity shortfall in the Nigeria, any investment made to the Nigerian power sector should be used to reinforce and expand our system in the short and long term and not to support loads of neighbouring countries. Ambitious plans to export power should be a thing of the future and efforts to further export additional power should be ceased until relatively stable and reliable power supply is available to Nigerians.

Granted, 200MW is not a huge figure in the large scheme of the power requirements in the country. However there is a significant cost to construct a 70km transmission line of the highest voltage in the country. This expense could have been better justified to expand and reinforce transmission facilities in Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN).

Below is a chart published by West African Power Pool (WAAP). The chart shows energy exchanges per country in GWhr for West African countries. From the chart, it is clear that Nigeria exports the most power to date when compared to other ECOWAS countries in WAAP.




....http://laselle-engineering..ca/2013/09/why-does-nigeria-export-power-when-it.html[/b]

because it was part of the deal to build the dam. which they have to maintain.

So just go through your history at PHCN. you will see it. And nigeria has to continue to supply them. there can not be change to that agreement. It is too late to change it.

Nigeria is not supplying benin 200WM, that is a lie...

@ musiwa
Nigeria supplying Benin 200MW is not a lie. There is an existing 70km line from ikeja substation to Benin. This was executed as part of the west African power pool agreement.

It would be wise to confirm the facts before claiming its a lie.

Part of a deal to build a dam? The transmission line was built for Nigeria to export power. Nigeria planned to make approximately $14m annually from the export.

Please do your research to support your claim that the post is a lie.

musiwa1a: because it was part of the deal to build the dam. which they have to maintain.

So just go through your history at PHCN. you will see it. And nigeria has to continue to supply them. there can not be change to that agreement. It is too late to change it.

Nigeria is not supplying benin 200WM, that is a lie...

Musiwa, it yaff do, go and sleep

The truth is that Nigeria planted her dam in thesame terestrial water of which Benin also suppose to build theirs & if Nigeria should allow Benin to build thesame hydro plant in that dam,there would be no much water for the rotation( Run ) of these generators in that dam in this case an agreement was reached for Nigeria to build & transmit part of it output to Benin instead of them both building in that same dam. Since then this agreement has been intact.Nigeria & Benin shares this same dam infact that dam is suppose to be owned by..... but we all know Nigeria & her being giant of Africa dominated that area. That all i know except a new agreement has been reached recently but Benin are not suppose to pay for energy from that dam except they asked more than it required in the initial agreement.

musiwa1a: because it was part of the deal to build the dam. which they have to maintain.

So just go through your history at PHCN. you will see it. And nigeria has to continue to supply them. there can not be change to that agreement. It is too late to change it.

Nigeria is not supplying benin 200WM, that is a lie...

o boy, Musiwa is surprisinly sane today! Or culd it be he is truely an "electricity enginneer"?

Simple!!!
Those thieves aren't after the well-being of Nigerians.
All they are after is how to generate more money for them to loot.
Bunch of I*diots

I dont knw about that?

Neither do I...All i knew is ASUU is on strike but Mr. President is busy staging is comeback in 2015>>

imagine!

musiwa1a: because it was part of the deal to build the dam. which they have to maintain.

So just go through your history at PHCN. you will see it. And nigeria has to continue to supply them. there can not be change to that agreement. It is too late to change it.

Nigeria is not supplying benin 200WM, that is a lie...

[size=14pt] Is that you?

Musiwa[/size]

We also supply Niger republic as well. Because if not they would build dam on niger river!

hammedkola: Neither do I...All i knew is ASUU is on strike but Mr. President is busy staging is comeback in 2015>>

ASUU is on strike so that they could help you in your English lectures better in well equipped lecture rooms
.
@OP, Benin had the resources to build their dam, if they had built it then, Nigeria would not be able to produce electricity at optimal capacity from our dam.
It is not dashing, it is partnership for mutual benefit

its tru dat nigeria export power,but let see it as a way of maintaining gøod lyt in nigeria,d water we are damming 4rm passes through benin republic,if we dont supply dem wit electricity they would be forced to dam the water from their syd...en dat would reduce d number of wat we generate naturally.

MAKE I JUST WASTE SPACE

u know Nigeria is a nyce Nation...

-Citizens are hungry and we are sending food abroad for those that are suffering as we do

-we dnt have security and we are sending troops to the neighboring country

-No electricity and the neighboring country that are tapping from us are celebrating 1 year of unblinking light

-we have the crude oil but we have the refineries in other nations while our own petroleum engineering graduates are unemployed

-we have qualify doctors here and our polithievians are going to abroad to take care of themselves and children

-we have banks here and our polithievians are looting our money and take it to Switzerland banks

-We have best schools here with just a token school fee and they are sending their children to abroad to study with huge amount of money.

God will judge ...

At the END you will realize that TIME changes THINGS.

Some explanations above by some posters calmed my nerves.
My question is ; How much MW does the Hydro-dam generate and how much of that is Nigeria using. Because if a country like Benin Republic is cheating us in that regard then we much be some bunch of dwarfs parading as giant and smart people.

Conji dey worry me

musiwa1a: because it was part of the deal to build the dam. which they have to maintain.

So just go through your history at PHCN. you will see it. And nigeria has to continue to supply them. there can not be change to that agreement. It is too late to change it.

Nigeria is not supplying benin 200WM, that is a lie...

thank God o, musiwa make sense small today. Lol

want to go through records to know what to type here




brb

Nigeria probably gets more money (directly into its treasury, after costs), from this simple point-to-point Benin republic deal, than it gets from its entire thieving shambolic NEPA (or woreva they call it now) operation!

They paid for it. If not, we wouldn't have been supplying them

Drsheddy: imagine!

say someting

hammedkola: Neither do I...All i knew is ASUU is on strike but Mr. President is busy staging is comeback in 2015>>

Students who speak wrong english like you actually made them go on strike.

It is KNOW not KNEW.
HIS comeback and not IS comeback


anyway me self no dey perfect.

bethnals: We also supply Niger republic as well. Because if not they would build dam on niger river!

\

This is the right answer. those guys are upstream and they also have the right to dam the river. its just a consensus ie pls dont pure sand for our garri downstream. very simple . just common sense. its just a percentage of the energy generated that they are given.

We must be getting something from it, more like a deal

Santi19: We must be getting something from it, more like a deal

We are getting more water for our dam, that is the deal

cogitoErgo: o boy, Musiwa is surprisinly sane today! Or culd it be he is truely an "electricity enginneer"?

seems he is one

The notion that you cannot have multiple dams on the same river is not accurate. Presently, dont we have the Kanji dam and the Jebba dam off the Niger river. There are also on going projects to add more dams on this river outside Nigeria in countries like Mali and Niger.

Of course we are getting something from supplying power to Republic of Benin, that is why the article mentions it as an export. There had to be an agreement before a transmission line is constructed to tie both countries together. Another article I read specifies that we get about $14 million annually from export tariffs over this line.

And what is the name of this new Nigerian Dam that some comments say got build and drove the agreement to supply Benin power? This 330KV transmission line was put into service in 2007. Was this dam constructed around that time? Regardless of the answers to the questions, it is not impossible to have multiple dams on the same river. Of course studies would have to be done to specify optimal spotting of these dams.

It is also true that Nigeria export power to Niger too. This is done over a 132KV transmission line that was constructed between in 1976. So this is a pretty old line that has been used for exports since 1976.

If you check on West African Power Pool (WAAP), you would see that this line was constructed as part of a WAAP plan to interconnect neighboring countries for exchange of power. This is a very very good idea. However, as Nigeria cannot meet its own demands at home, we should be focusing on reinforcing and expanding our own transmission network before considering investing in exports. The link in the posted article for this topic contains a graph that show how much power Nigeria exported in GWH compared to neighboring countries.

If anyone has more information about this dam eg. Name, capacity. Please share.