By Alemma Aliu

BENIN CITY—THE Management of Benin Electricity Management Company, BEDC Plc,  weekend, differed with the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, over recent power outages in parts of Benin City and its environs.

electricity

State Head of BEDC, Fidelis Obishai said that the outage was occasioned by faulty transformers belonging to the Transmission Company of Nigeria.

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Obishai explained that the TCN lost its 60MVA transformer on September 24, a development he said affected three major 33KV feeders belonging to the BEDC and connected to Ikpoba dam injection substation, Evbuotubu/Egor and Sapele road/Koko feeders.

But an official of TCN in Benin City told Vanguard yesterday that the company had fixed the transformer and that the BEDC should not shift the blame on it. “I can tell you that the said transformer has been fixed since Thursday morning”

But Obishai noted that the distribution company had to introduce a load-shedding plan with a six-hour rotation and moved the affected customers to other feeders in order to restore power.

“When it happened, we were thinking that it was a one-day or two affair. As I speak to you, the transformer is still out of circuit. I cannot even tell when that transformer will be coming back to service.

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“The best option we needed immediately was to rearrange our light distribution. So, we had to come up with a load shedding plan because if I do not rotate the loading, we would overload the transformers.

“So, what we did was to spread out our load so that instead of those customers affected to be out (of power) for 24 hours a day, they are sure of getting, at least, 12 hours in a day. Those who were enjoying the 12 or 18 hours arrangement are affected by this.”

He further disclosed that the 150MVA transformer in Ihovbor, responsible for power supply to major areas in the Ovia North-East Local Government Area of the state, broke down on October 8 but was restored to circuit on Thursday.”