Power generation falls to 2,627MW as more plants go dormant

Total generated power in the country slumped dramatically to 2,626.9MW on Monday from the 3,738MW reported the day before, signalling a 42% single-day fall, data from the Nigerian Electricity System Operator has revealed.

Between the days, the number of idle power plants doubled with 10 of them emerging idle on Monday compared to the 5 recorded on Sunday.

Ihovbor, Gbarain, Alaoji, Olorunsogo II and Omotosho II together with ASCO, Geregu II, AES, Sapele II and Ibom made up the power plants that were not producing electricity yesterday.

The plants went out of operations on various grounds ranging from poor demand from power distribution companies, dearth of gas supply and maintenance hitches to breaching of gas pipeline and frequency response.

17 plants were up and running on Monday compared to the 22 on the previous day. Yet, the production levels of a couple of them fell below their installed capacity.

About 80% of Nigeria’s power generation comes from gas while the remainder is contributed by hydro sources located in Kainji, Shiroro and Jebba dams.

“The power sector lost an estimated N2.50bn on Sunday due to constraints from insufficient gas supply, distribution infrastructure and transmission infrastructure,” said the Advisory Power Team, Vice President’s Office on Monday.

It observed that as much as 2,282.5MW could not be produced on account of absence of gas just as it cited “high frequency resulting from the unavailability of distribution infrastructure” as the reason for the inability to generate another 2,400.9MW.

The team went further to say poor transmission infrastructure and water management left 530MW capacity unused.