The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola has said about 1,129 megawatts (mw) more electricity will be added to the national grid when eight power plants are commisoned in 2018.
Fashola who said this at the 22nd power sector meeting in Geregu Power Plc in Kogi state yesterday, said there was need to evacuate the currently constrained 2,000mw before the new capacity comes to the grid.
He said 450mw is expected from Azura Power in Edo, 215mw from Kaduna plant, 40mw Kashimbilla in Taraba, and 29mw Dadin Kowa in Gombe.
Others are 30mw Gurara in Kaduna, 10mw Katsina wind power, 240mw from Afam III in Rivers and 115mw Gbarain NIPP in Bayelsa state. “We cannot afford to keep all these power without selling them; that is not good for the business for those who have invested in them,” Fashola noted.
He also said Nigeria attained the highest peak generation of 5,155mw power generation last Friday above the 5,074mw attained in February 2016 due to improvements in gas supply to GenCos with the federal government’s N701 billion Payment Assurance Guarantee (PAG) that enables GenCos to promptly pay for gas and other services.
“When I visited in 2016, only one turbine was running in each of Geregu I and II plants because of no gas out of six turbines. Today, all the three turbines in each are running because there is now some gas,” the minister said.
Fashola however noted that despite the 7,000mw generation and transmission capacities, 2,000mw of electricity is still constrained due to inadequate demand for electricity by the Distribution Companies (DisCos).
“That is the problem now, from no power, to more power that we can’t sell. We have made progress in generation and transmission and now we can move our capacity to the distribution so that we can address it,” Fashola said.
In his address, the Managing Director of Geregu Power, Mr Adeyemi Adenuga said the firm has invested over $94 billion to improve its plant since privatisation in 2013.
He noted that the three generation unit are operational while appealing to the DisCos to raise their power supply demands so the GenCo can operate at full capacity.
