[ODUNEWS] – Nigeria’s national electricity grid has collapsed again, throwing several cities including the federal capital, Abuja, into darkness.
This marks the fifth time in 2022, that the national grid would break down, this was reported to have occurred on Sunday, around 6.49 pm, leading to the shutdown of the outgoing electricity feeders of some power distribution companies.
Power distributors in Kaduna, Lagos and other parts of the country said they have not been able to receive bulk electricity from the national supply line.
Nigeria’s power grid collapsed twice in March and twice again in April this year, making the power generation on the system fluctuate, due to various concerns such as gas constraints, water management challenges, and gas pipeline vandalism, among others.
“We regret to inform you that the power outage being experienced in our franchise states, is due to system collapse of the national grid. The collapse occurred at about 18:47 pm this evening, hence the loss of supply on all our outgoing feeders.
“Power supply shall be restored as soon as the national grid is powered back”, Kaduna Electric announced on Sunday evening.
Eko Electricity in its own statement said, “We regret to inform you of the ongoing system collapse on the national grid. This has affected our entire network and impacted our ability to deliver optimum service. Please bear with us as we are working with our TCN partners on a swift resolution.”
In its own statement, Abuja Electricity said: “The current power outage is due to a system failure from the national grid. The system collapsed at about 6.49 pm today, 12th June 2022, causing the outage currently being experienced. We appeal for your understanding as all stakeholders are working hard to restore normal supply.”
Also, the Head of Corporate Communications, EEDC, Emeka Ezeh, said the grid collapse threw five states under the Disco’s franchise area in total blackout.
A notice from the Disco, which he signed, read in part, “The Enugu Electricity Distribution Company Plc, wishes to inform her esteemed customers of a system collapse which occurred at 6.49 pm this evening, Sunday.
“As a result of this development, all our outgoing feeders are out and this has affected supply to our customers in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo states.”
As of 6:00 pm on Sunday, June 12, 2022, power generation on the national grid was 1,353.80 megawatts (MW), generated by 13 GenCos shortly before the system crashed.
There are up to 24 active Gencos on the grid system, but even from the 13 GenCos on Sunday evening, only Delta (Ughelli) GenCo did up to 371MW; Rivers IPP had 156MW, Omotosho did 130MW, Olorunsogo did 128MW, while the other nine GenCos did not generate up to 100MW.
Sadly, the baseload GenCos which are the three hydropower plants that guarantee stable electricity were affected.
While Kainji had 51MW, Jebba had 88MW and Shiroro was down some 45 minutes before the national grid collapse.
Reports from the Nigeria System Operations, a section of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) and grid manager, indicate that there has been a lull in power generation.
