Patrick Ugeh
11 February 2008
Abuja — The epileptic power supply being experienced at present in the country may further worsen as power generation has dropped.
Honorary Strategic Adviser to President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua on Energy, Dr. Rilwanu Lukman, has said at the weekend that the generating capacity of the nation's 10 power stations has dropped drastically.
This means that total darkness may even be under way.
Lukman said Nigeria's quest for a stable power supply would remain a mirage unless concrete efforts were put in place to save the power sector from collapse.
In a paper entitled: "Confronting Nigeria's Energy Challenge: The imperative of immediate reforms," which he delivered at the pre-convocation lecture of the Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi at the weekend, Lukman said apart from Okpai power station commissioned last year and operating at 90 per cent capacity, the nine others were operating at 30 per cent installed capacity.
Egbin station commissioned in 1985 with the capacity to generate 1,320 MW, had dropped to about 600 MW, while Delta power station built in 1966 with an initial installed capacity of 72 MW and raised to 918 MW in 1990 had dropped to 580 MW, he said.
According to the former OPEC president, Sapele power station built in 1981 with an installed capacity of 1,020 MW had been reduced to 150 MW, while Afam with 972 MW in 2001 had nosedived to 410 MW.
Lukman said that Kainji power station with installed capacity of 760 MW had dropped to 450 MW.
The honorary presidential adviser said Shiroro and Jebba power stations were the only ones still capable of generating to their installed capacities of 600 MW and 578.4 MW respectively.
Geregu, Papalanto and Omotosho power stations were still at 41 MW, 335 MW and 335 MW respectively, he said
"With a population of over 140 million people, Nigeria can only boast of 6,000 MW generation installed capacity," he said.
Lukman said the hope of generating electricity above 4000 megawatt this year was unattainable.
He stated that although the nation's short term demand was 8000MW, only 4000MW could be attained. A target to attain 10,000 had been set for last December.
Lukman identified hasty privatisation, improper coordination in the power sector and inadequate tariff structure as factors responsible for the failure of the reforms begun by the Obasanjo administration.
He called for an effective holistic master plan for the development of the electricity industry, including appropriate funding.
Without them, he said, no nation could develop that sector.
The former OPEC president, however, said there could not be a one-off solution to the problem of power supply, describing the problem as a moving target.
Breaking down the submissions of the power generating companies, Lukman said Egbin would generate 600MW with additional 400MW in August on completion of work on units 6 and 2; Delta 580MW; Sapele 150MW; Afam 410MW; Kainji 450MW from April to July due to water management.
For the same reason, he explained, Jebba would generate 482MW from April to July, and then from August to October; while Shiroro would guarantee 200MW from April to July due to water management, and from August to September, 2008.
Added to this is another 1,131MW to be generated by AES (286MW); Geregu (170MW); Omotosho (75MW); Papalanto (75MW); Okpai (480MW); and Omoku (50MW).
He said the challenge in transmission was to boost power wheeling capacity to 4000MW, increase flexibility in system operation and control, improve voltage regulation and quality of power supply, improve system protection and availability of substation equipment for power delivery. Others are improvement in lifespan of transformers, and reduction in system collapse.
The presidential adviser however pointed out that low voltage would still persist in the north-eastern and north-western parts of the country pending the completion of the installation of equipment for system compensation, which is ongoing.
He stated that the unbundling of PHCN into 18 units had created a gap in supervision and made corporate governance difficult while poorly planned and unrealistic timelines with "undue emphasis on privatisation" had not allowed for consolidation of the gains achieved.
He reiterated that most of the equipment in use had outlived their lifespan of 30-35 years, a major cause of the problems in the sector.
To boost distribution, he disclosed plans to replace failed distribution transformers and their auxiliaries; construct new distribution injection substations to relieve the overloaded locations; and replace faulty power transformers and upgrade critically overloaded injection substations.
He disclosed that in the short term, a review of the ongoing projects and rehabilitation programmes (NIPP/TDP) was under way to identify: voltage irregularities, status of rehabilitation programmes, high transmission and distribution losses, billing and metering inefficiency, overloaded transformers and power theft.
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Some of the facts about the problems of the power shortage in the country are finally coming out. All installed 10 stations in the country are operating at about 30% capacity except Okpai station commissioned last year operating at 90% capacity. Furthermore, the total installed capacity is 6000MW as opposed to 8000MW required capacity so that even if all stations are operating at full capacity of 6000MW the country will still be experiencing brown out. However, I disagree with the estimate capacity of 8000MW required by a country of over 120m people. It is too low if you can imagine that Kuwait and Qatar with a population of a very small fraction of Nigeria's has over 5000MW of just additional power installed by GE. Other outstanding complaints concern the cost of installed plants and also privatization of the power plant sector. The power plant is a very capital intensive project but it is a bitter fact that without good supply of electricity the country cannot develop. As far as privatization is concerned, those who were following the various jugglings made by the former administration found out that after trying several alternatives arrived at privatization as probably the optimum solution. We know that the problem with running a corporation by the government in Nigeria is that you have to satisfy the ethnic representation of the management even when you know that it may require plugging the round hole with square pegg. This situation could be avoided by privatization where the country demands high efficiency from the operating company. However, what is required now is for the government to first do everything posibble to get all the 10 stations running at the design capacity and go back to the drawing board to plan for further extra power plants installations. The government should not overlook the fact that there is immense supply of coal in the country and it will be wise to install some coal-fired plants near the coal mines.
If this is the case then what did they(THE LAST GOVT) spend the 10 or 16 billion dollars on?This is a huge joke as has been the case over the years in Nigeria. Instead of yaradua investigating what the last govt did on some sectors,notably power,they,re shying away from telling the nation what,s going on.The last couple of days I read that yaradua see,s obansajo as his leader which ultimately sculpers our fight to see him being investigated for some mismanagement of the past govt.It,s clear that there,s so much injustice taking place down there and the resultant effects on everyone,s daily life,it,s affecting social, economic, political, sport, health and all that make,s a country funtion nomally.Let,s stop this waste of our and others time, life, opportunities.