#lightupnigeria
Light Up Nigeria published a series of facts about power in Nigeria this morning. Jeremy compiled them, and I'm piggy backing on his work.

Credit goes to Amara Nwankpa for collating these facts.

*1881: year Electricity was first generated in England. 15 yrs before Nigeria

*1896 The year electricity was first generated in Nigeria. Place was Ijora, in Lagos.

*60KW - Nigeria's generation capacity in 1896.

*Kainji Dam: The oldest, still functional power plant in Nigeria, is about 40 years old.

*48% - percentage of Nigerians who have NO source of power, 114 years after we first generated power in Nigeria,

*40%: percentage of the population served by the National grid

*60%: The average percentage of time when the 40% served by the grid don't have power.

*Kainji Dam: What it was designed produce 760MW, What it is producing now: 400MW. Why? Faulty parts

*3: Number of Hydro Plants in Nigeria. 1939: Amount of power in MW, they are supposed to generate. 1000: What they generate

*11: Number of Thermal Plants in NG. 5976: Amount of power in MW, they are supposed to generate. 2589: What they generate

*There are 16 ongoing power generation projects designed to generate 12,500MW for the national grid

*If the projects were completed today, Nigeria would have 20,000MW capacity in generation. BUT,

*BUT, The National transmission grid is only designed to carry 4,800MW. So 75% of that capacity will useless,

*But it also gets WORSE. Some of the electricity generated is "lost" in transmission. (Transmission Loss)

*Transmission losses usually should not exceed 7%. This means that if 100MW is generated, at least 93MW should get to u!

*The Transmission losses on the Nigerian grid is 35%!!!!! So if 100MW is generated only 65MW gets to you!!

*Please find a diagram of the NG transmission system attached. Notice the TX losses?? http://yfrog.com/114n5g

*Transmission losses in Nigeria are the highest in the world. more than 3 times what is normal.

*Even if we generate 2000GW, our grid will only be able to carry 4800 MW and 1,600MW of that will be WASTED

*So why does the Nigerian transmission grid have such a high loss?? Sabotage! Illegal Connections, Poor Equipment

*There were 12 cases of sabotage of the transmission grid in Nigeria in 2008 alone. (TCN)

*N1m. The amount in Naira paid to Ajibode Community as reward 4 assistance in apprehension of two powerline vandals in 08.

*30 years: The average age of the equipment on the National grid. Older than most of you!!

*To illustrate the capacity issues on the National grid consider the following example:

*River State spends $161m to generate 275MW. Capacity of Grid into Rivers 100MW. 175MW: what RSG paid 4 they don't get

*Rivers State is only getting 40% benefit of their own investment because of grid limitations.

*Over 90 transmission projects are ongoing, to add an additional 9,000MW to the capacity of the grid

*Even if all 90 transmission projects are completed, There will still be a shortfall of 10,000MW in capacity. God dey.

*But even if we complete all these projects, the biggest question is HOW WILL THEY BE MAINTAINED?

*For more information on the status of power generation projects: http:///cs056D Jan 2010, but still current.

*EFCC survey (published 2010), PHCN ranked least performing & least honest, less than political parties or the police!

*According to the same survey, 82% of the businesses surveyed admit they have bribed PHCN for "better treatment"

*If we are bribing PHCN, will they not be corrupt?

*N7/KWh - How much we buy power in Nigeria. N18/KWh - About how much it costs to generate

*N11/KWh - About how much of your electricity bill Govt. pays for you (subsidy). (shrug)

*How much of our PHCN bills do we really pay? Lets do a small check.

*950m - how much in naira Consumers in the Diobu Business Unit in PH Rivers State alone owed PHCN as at March 2010

*98bn - Amount in naira owed to PHCN by FGN MDA as at April 2009.

*70bn - Amount owed in debt to PHCN due to unsettled bills as march 2010 - Minister of State for power.

*So if the customers and the govt. are owing PHCN, how do the staff get paid?

*If you are not getting paid or paid well, are you more likely to collect bribes from saboteurs?

*Now lets talk about gas. Gas is the source of fuel for 40% of all power generated in Nigeria.

*Nigeria produces 4.2bcfd of gas every year. 55% of that is flared (burnt up)

*The amount of gas flared in Nigeria creates about 70 million metric tons of CO2 emissions per year. BIG pollution

*Imagine stacking up $2.5bn in $100 notes and burning them up in a huge inferno? That’s what we do when we flare gas!

*The amount of gas we flare can provide electricity for ALL OF Sub-Saharan Africa

*But that is not all. The amount of gas we flare is equivalent to $2.5 BILLION every year!!

*The state of Florida has 55,460MW generating capacity. About 10 times that of Nigeria

*Texas can generate 104,966MW of electricity - beat that with a stick.

*There are 16 ongoing power generation projects designed to generate 12,500MW for the national grid

*If the projects were completed today, Nigeria would have 20,000MW capacity in generation. BUT,

Kobojunkie:


This is a big reason why I argued on a thread some months ago that Nigerians WILL NOT be able to pay for electricity and so Government needs to look into restructuring it's subsidy program to help tackle that issue or we will be no better than where we are today.

Kobojunkie:

@Poster, how much electricity does Nigeria currently generate though? As of april, I believe the number was said to be at about 3600MW, so how can 12500MW make that 20000MW?

3,600 MW, I thought it was around 6,000! Anyways does business-generated power count too? Because then it could be over 10,000 MW, I'm positive. Which would make the added 12,500 MW over 20,000 MW. Boy imagine how much economic growth comes with over 12,500 more megawatts of power

Eddeux:

Opening up the power sector to foreign investment, and offering subsidies would be the best way to achieve greater capacity.
Also, it wouldn't be a bad idea to privatize PHCN. I'm sure businessmen can't do anymore damage than the already corrupt officials working for PHCN. 3,600 MW, I thought it was around 6,000! Anyways does business-generated power count too? Because then it could be over 10,000 MW, I'm positive. Which would make the added 12,500 MW over 20,000 MW. Boy imagine how much economic growth comes with over 12,500 more megawatts of power