After collapsing for the third time in a month on Friday, power generation to Nigeria’s national grid on Sunday recovered with 13 plants clocking 2,152.60 Mega Watts as at 5pm.
The grid had collapsed on Friday around 6.30pm throwing the country into darkness.
The Minister of Power, Abubakar Aliyu, attributed the collapse to acts of vandalism on a transmission tower on the Odukpani-Ikot Ekpene 330kV double circuit transmission line that resulted in a sudden loss of about 400MW of generation.
“This consequently led to a cascade of plants shut down across the country. We wish to notify the public that power on the grid is being restored sequentially by the System Operator as other on-grid power plants are being dispatched to cover the lost generation capacity from the Calabar power plant owned by the Niger Power Holding Company Ltd,” the government added.
According to the minister in a statement by his Media aide, Isa Sanusi, while a detailed investigation into the immediate and remote causes of the recurring grid failure was currently ongoing by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission and System Operator (the operator of the national grid), adding that the process of restoring supply was ongoing with some sections of the national grid already energised and supply restored to consumers.
“We wish to assure Nigerians that the Federal Government is working assiduously to deliver on the much-needed reforms and investments, including SCADA, that are critical to improving the capacity and reliability of the national grid.
“This is in line with the Mr. President’s directives on closing infrastructure deficits in critical sectors of the Nigerian economy,” he noted