By Obas Esiedesa – Abuja

Nigeria’s poor electricity generation continued on Sunday with 18 power plants generating just 3,676.70 megawatts with Egbin Power back on the national grid with 437MW.

Checks by Vanguard on national grid data supplied by the System Operator, an autonomous unit at the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), showed that as at 3pm yesterday, Delta Power was the highest generator with 497MW, Kainji Hydro at 414MW; Geregu Power 396MW and Jebba Hydro 336MW.

Other plants generating above the 100MW mark were Azura-Edo 284MW; Afam VI 215MW; Shiroro Hydro 207MW; Rivers IPP 153MW and Geregu NIPP 116MW.

Egbin, Nigeria’s largest power plant with 1,036MW capacity had been completely off the national grid since a fire incident last Wednesday.

The management of the power company had earlier disclosed that plant operations have resumed following the fire incident.
 
It stated: “Unit (ST05) was put back in service and synchronized to the national grid at 19:57 hours on 4th February and is back on stream generating 220mw.
 
“The Technical team at the plant is working tirelessly to ensure that an additional 660mw is added to the grid before the weekend runs out.

ALSO READ: APC/PDP: Nigeria not ripe for two-party system ― CSOs

“Egbin continues to work with the regulatory authorities and other stakeholders to achieve full restoration in line with global health, safety, and environmental standards.
 
“While thanking our employees, the public, our partners and stakeholders for their unwavering support, cooperation and understanding, we use this medium to reiterate our commitment to bringing energy to life responsibly through safe, innovative and sustainable power generation”, it added.
 
Also, the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN attributed the ongoing load shedding in the Lagos axis to the fire incident which necessitated the shutdown of all the power generating units in the power station.
 
“With the shutdown of the units, a total of 630MW was removed from the grid”, TCN General Manager Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah explained.
 
Mbah stated that the removal of 630MW from the grid at the same time means that “TCN had to strive to ensure that it achieves generation load balance to maintain the stability of the grid.

“This it did by reducing bulk electricity to Lagos, to avoid overloading the 330kV lines within the state, while the third unit at the Shiroro Station was tied.

“These were necessary to avoid the collapse of the nation’s grid”.

Vanguard News Nigeria