But the Managing Director of Mainstream Energy Solutions Limited, the core investors of Jebba and Kainji Hydro power plants, Mr. Lamu Audu, in a telephone interview with Daily Sun yesterday, dispelled reports that Jebba Hydro Power plant is down as a result of system collapse.
Rather, Audu explained that it was the national grid that collapsed making it impossible for the Jebba power plant to evacuate its 400 megawatts of electricity generated into the national grid system.
Audu,an engineer explained that the national grid needs at least 1,500mw for it to come on stream and effectively function. Kainji and Jebba have an installed capacity of 705mw,which,he said was not enough for the national grid to function effectively.
Regretably, he said Ughelli and Egbin power plants that are supposed to provide additional generation capacity for the national grid system, suffered set back as a result of the strike action embarked upon by Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association(PENGASSAN) branch of Nigerian Gas Company (NGC) that supplies gas to the thermal power plants.
‘‘The challenge is that, we do not have enough power in the national grid and that led to a system collapse. So it would be wrong for anyone to say that, Jebba Power Plant has collapsed. Power generation for onward transmission to the grid is a collaborative effort. Jebba alone cannot generate the 1,500mw needed by the grid system,’ ’he said.In a related development, the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has decried the inability of 18 power plants to generate electricity as a result of pipeline vandalism, leading to loss of over 2,000MW.
The commission in a statement signed by its Chairman Mr. Sam Amadi, regretted that in the last couple of months, electricity supply has been generally poor on account of increase in vandalism, especially during the run up to the April 2015 elections.
“At present, 18 out of the 23 power plants in the country are unable to generate electricity due to shortage of gas supply to the thermal plants with one of the hydro stations faced with water management issue”.
This situation, he said, is further compounded by the recent industrial actions embarked upon by workers in the oil and gas industry, a development which has taken a toll on all other sectors of the economy. The Commission said,it had proactively engaged the gas supply companies and licensees when two weeks ago discussion was held on how to shore up gas supply in order to increase power supply.
‘‘However, we have continued to engage with relevant authorities on how fast we can address shortage of gas supply to the thermal plants. We are also engaging with the industry operators on how to improve electricity supply,’’ the statement stated.
-Sun