The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) announced on Sunday that the national power grid has been restored following a partial collapse on Saturday.
TCN Public Affairs General Manager, Ndidi Mbah, described the incident as a partial disturbance that occurred around 15:09 on July 6, 2024. According to Mbah, this marks the third partial disturbance and the first total disturbance of the grid this year.
Mbah explained that the grid collapse was likely triggered by the unexpected tripping of three units at a power-generating station, which removed 313MW from the grid, causing instability and a subsequent loss of bulk supply to part of the national grid.
“Meanwhile, the system operator reacted to the sudden drop in generation which led to a dip in frequency by islanding a section of the grid which includes the Ibom Power Station through which the company continued to feed Uyo, Aba, Itu, Eket, Calabar, etc. even when the other section of the grid had no supply,” Mbah said.
Restoration efforts began immediately, and by 21:57 the same day, the affected sections of the grid were fully restored.
The recent grid collapse has sparked criticism from electricity consumers, who condemned the frequent outages and the recent hike in electricity tariffs. Power generation dropped to a mere 70MW at 3 pm on Saturday after peaking at 3916MW earlier in the day, leading to zero allocation for distribution companies by Saturday evening.
The collapse occurred just three days after the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission approved a tariff increase for Band A customers, raising rates from N206.80 per kilowatt-hour to N209.50/kWh.
Princewill Okorie, Executive Director of the Electricity Consumer Protection Advocacy Centre, lamented the inefficiencies in the power sector despite the tariff increases. Okorie criticized the continuous billing of unmetered customers during outages and questioned the quality of materials and management of the grid.
“What are the causes of these grid collapses? Are the materials used in building the grid of good quality and standard? Who is managing the grid?” Okorie asked. He urged the government to address these issues to prevent further collapses.
Adetayo Adegbemle, Executive Director of PowerUp Nigeria, echoed these sentiments, calling for accountability within the electricity value chain. “I think everyone involved in the value chain should be embarrassed by the regular occurrence and inability to put measures in place to avoid this constant grid collapse,” he said.
Adegbemle suggested that leadership changes might be necessary to drive improvements. “If the head of TCN, for instance, is to lose his job tonight, the next MD would be more willing to work with other subsectors to ensure this does not happen again,” he added.
The Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC) confirmed that the grid disturbance affected its TCN stations, leading to service disruptions in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo States. Kano DisCo also reported a power outage due to the grid collapse and assured customers that supply would be restored once the grid is back online.
