Power outage: FG to restore electricity nationwide today
…Gas shortage responsible for power shortage — Expert
…As SERAP charges FG to probe missing N11trn electricity fund
By Uthman Salami
The federal government has promised that power supply would be restored to normalcy today after almost a week of nationwide blackout.
Nigerians and businesses have been hit by the current blackout in the country because of grid collapse caused by low gas-power generation from sabotage of gas pipelines, leading to the shutdown of power plants.
However, in its quest to restore power supply to normalcy, the ministry of power said, “The ‘pigging- of the gas pipeline supplying gas to the Odukponi power plant is scheduled for completion on March 21st, 2022 thus ramping up generation by about 4100MW.”
The Minister of Power Engr. Abubakar D. Aliyu made this known on his Twitter handle during the weekend.
The Minister of Power while speaking on the restoration of Power said, “The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission has approved a special gas pricing for emergency contracting of gas from the Nigerian Gas Marketing Company Ltd. We expect an on-grid improvement of about 800MW generation capacity from the NDPHC plants.
“In the medium term, we have agreed with NGPIC (a subsidiary of NNPC) on the framework for the overhaul of the Okolomo gas processing plant thereby restoring the full capacity of the 650MW Afom VI combined cycle power plant.
“While the recent spate of system collapse is regrettable, it was a direct consequence of a snap-on o 330kV transmission line. The mitigation measures for avoiding such incidence of blackouts ore being implemented through several interventions including the Presidential Power Initiative.”
While assuring the general public, the Federal Government said, “All electricity consumers that all relevant agencies involved in the restoration of normality in power supply have been charged to act in the context of the emergency state of the industry. The federal Ministry of Power shall continue to periodically update the nation on the progress.”
Meanwhile, an expert in the power industry has maintained that gas shortage was responsible for frequent power outage.
Ugochukwu Obi-Chukwu, while taking listeners through the chain of electricity in Nigeria during the OnTheMoney series, a weekend conversation by experts on Clubhouse, said oil and gas companies were at the tail end of the distribution as these companies typically rely on gas to fire their engines.
Speaking on the incessant power outage in the country, Obi-Chukwu said, “When there is lack of gas, it results into a consequent lack of fuel to power generating plant, and if you can’t power the generating plant, you can’t generate enough power for the generating companies.
“Today, based on the record, the amount of gas that Nigeria pushes into the power sector to generating plant is not enough – the available gas can only generate as much as 4,000MW (out of 8000MW needed). At the national grid level, they need maximum of 5,000MW but on average because of maintenance issues and the ageing grid we have, they can typically fire between 3500MW and slightly over 4,000MW at the grid level.
“In December, when there was a lot of light, the hydro was working and there was a lot of gas being fired and so we were generating over 4,000MW and sometimes they did above it.
“But what has happened now is a plethora of things. One, there has been a lot of gas shortages across the country so enough gas is not being fed to the generating companies. Also, some of the generating companies as well are operating scheduled maintenances and this means that the power they are generating is not enough – if you don’t generate enough power at the transmission level, you can’t do much. Transmission needs a lot of willing capacity to maintain the grid, if there is no willing capacity, it typically has system collapses.
“The way the system works is that the system needs to have a balance, but because you don’t have that balance you have occasional grid collapses. On the distribution side as well, they now start to ration power because they are not getting enough from the transmission end to deliver to distribution end.”
On the other hand, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has charged the President, Muhammadu Buhari, to “direct the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice Mr Abubakar Malami (SAN), and appropriate anti-corruption agencies to promptly and thoroughly investigate how over N11 trillion meant to provide regular electricity supply has been allegedly squandered by governments since 1999.”
While charging the Federal Government to probe whoever is culpable, SERAP also urged the President to refer to the International Criminal Court, all unimplemented reports of corruption in the electricity sector gathering dust on the shelves, and to arrest and surrender those named in the reports to the court for prosecution.
Stressing further on the probe, the organization charged the government to launch an investigation into the allegations of missing N11 trillion electricity funds, the prosecution of suspected perpetrators and recovering any missing public funds would end a culture of impunity and subsequently address the persistent collapse of the electricity grid.
