Nigeria captures $10.1m electricity bill abroad, power grids collapse at home

Nigeria has decided to recover $10.1 million owed it in electricity bill from its neighbours, Benin and Niger republics and threatened to disconnect the two countries if they failed to comply but it fails to sustain power grids at home.

Both made the payment through their respective power firms, with NIGELEC of the Republic of Niger paying $3.79m, while the Community Electric du Benin of the Republic of Benin remitted $6.32m to Nigeria’s electricity market.

Nigeria sells power to the Republics of Togo, Niger and Benin, and classifies the West African countries as international customers.

Back home Africa’s most populous nation finds it tough to sustain its power grid, which collapses frequently.

Inefficient management in Nigeria’s power sector has in recent times led to nationwide blackouts and generated a lot of criticism from consumers and other stakeholders.

This has shown that the problem of the power sector is not only technical but also about how those entrusted with the management of the system govern it.

This has reinforced calls by concerned groups and individuals saying the transmission company of Nigeria should not be left in the hands of government officials that would not mind or know the implication of their inefficient handling of situations, which impact on electricity value chains and by extension on the economy in general.

Nigeria’s electricity grid collapsed twice in the last two months, once in June and another in July caused by infrastructure deficit, data obtained from the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and Housing show.

Nigeria’s total power on the grid dropped from a high of 3,659.5 megawatts on June 7 to as low as 41.4MW on June 8. When this happened the Transmission Company of Nigeria responded.

“The Transmission Company of Nigeria hereby state that as a result of gas pipeline rupture on the 15th of June, 2018, as well as technical issues at the Shell gas wells on the 16th of June, there has been a sharp drop in generation into the grid by a total of 1,087.6MW, resulting in load-shedding nationwide, necessary to maintain stability of the grid” Ndidi Mbah, general manager, public affairs, Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) explained in an earlier email response. This is not the first power grid collapse in 2018.

On July 8, another collapse of the grid occurred as the system dropped from a high of 4,089.1MW on July 7 to a low of 92.3MW the next day. So far, no grid collapse has been recorded in August 2018. Nigeria’s power generation figures hovered between a low of 3,000MW and a high of 4,800MW in the first eight days of the month.

Looking back, two days into 2018, Nigeria’s power transmission grid recorded a first major collapse, January 2nd night due to a fire incident on a gas supply pipeline leading to widespread blackout across the country, BusinessDay had reported.

STEPHEN ONYEKWELU