National grid collapse to zero Megawatts for the 7th time in 2022
The national power grid crashed to zero megawatts (MW) at 10:51 a.m. Monday, causing a nationwide outage.
The development came days after electricity consumers said they had enjoyed an improved supply.
The national grid had generated 3,712MW from 21 generating companies (GenCos) as of 10am Monday before falling to 0MW an hour later.
According to System Operations, only part of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), Afam IV, was connected to the grid as of 12 p.m., but without a supply.
On Sunday, the highest generation was 4,100 MW while the lowest was 3,652 MW, with the frequency varying between 49.04 hertz (Hz) and 50.34 Hz.
Since July 1 of this year, consumers reported increasing electricity supply in their various areas.
For example, the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC) recently confirmed an increase in its daily allocation from the 300 MW it previously distributed to over 500 MW.
Although the national grid had not exceeded 5,000MW, the Daily Trust found that levels of load rejection had dropped significantly, particularly on the DisCos’ networks, with some customers entitled to five hours of supply and recording more than 12 hours daily.
Nigeria’s Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) had traced improvements in electricity supply across the country to the partial activation of contracts aimed at making operators in the sector liable for willful incompetence.
The national power grid collapsed twice, in July and August, but was quickly restored and power supplies improved prior to the latest system collapse on Monday.
According to records, this is the seventh system crash this year, many more than last year’s three.
Though TCN, the national grid manager, had yet to determine the cause of the crash, some insiders said it could be due to maintenance scheduled for Monday on the 330-kilovolt Jos-Bauchi transmission line.
Some DisCos, including Kaduna Electric, Enugu and Kano, had already notified their customers of the nationwide outage and indicated that efforts to restore supply were underway.
