Nigeria’s electricity grid suffers 162 collapses in 11 years – Power generation companies

The Association of Power Generation Companies (APGC) on Thursday said that the nation has recorded 162 cases of grid collapse from 2013 to date.

The APGC Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Joy Ogaji, disclosed this while speaking at the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) public hearing to address the recurring grid collapses and widespread outages in Abuja on Thursday.

“From the association data taken from 2013 till date the grid has collapsed 162 times,” Ms Ogaji said.

In recent times, the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) has reported cases of national grid system collapses, resulting in reduced electricity allocation to electricity distribution companies in the country.

Last Saturday, Nigeria’s electricity grid collapsed again, throwing several cities into darkness.

Electricity companies announced that the grid collapsed around 08:15 a.m. on Saturday. This latest collapse comes days after the grid collapsed last Tuesday.

Speaking on Thursday Ms Ogaji said the level of frequency fluctuation and frequency crippling on the grid cannot be cured by a free governor.

“Before the grid code specified or the switch is up to like four. But we have done investigation and found out that sometimes the cripple is well over four, even up to ten, that is eating into somebody’s generation that would have fetched them money.

“So while I am not saying that spinning reserve is a solution, I believe that putting a spinning reserve and the free governor mode side by side can cure the volatility on the grid, because research shows that about hundreds of steel mills operate on our grid, and we know what steel mills does to frequency,” she said.

According to her, the association did a study and found out that 95 per cent of the time, from 2013 till date, the grid has not been in compliance with the grid code requirement of 50 hertz.

“It has always been out of frequency requirement of the grid,” she added.

In recent years, the power sector has experienced many challenges in areas of electricity policy enforcement, regulatory uncertainty, gas supply, transmission system constraints, and significant power sector planning shortfalls.

In November 2013, the federal government privatised all power generation and 11 distribution companies, with the government retaining the ownership of the transmission company. This was to improve efficiency in the sector.

However, since the privatisation, the grid has continued to collapse amid efforts to reposition the power sector.