The national electricity grid collapsed on Wednesday, dropping power generation to about 260 megawatts (MW) and causing nationwide outage.
According to real-time power grid records by the Independent System Operations (ISO) section of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), none of the over 20 generation Companies (GenCos) produced energy as of 1pm due to the system collapse while it was not immediately clear what caused the power grid disturbance.
As of Tuesday, the peak power generation was 4,757MW while the lowest generation was 3,976MW. While 101,605 megawatts hour (MWH) energy was generated, consumers through the 11 Distribution Companies (DisCos) utilised 99,955MWH.
However, by Wednesday afternoon, checks indicated that only five of the 11 DisCos had slight energy allocation while the six others had no energy to supply to their customers across the states.
Their energy load expectations also dropped from over 4,000MW previously to 260MW by 1:00pm on Wednesday.
For instance, Abuja DisCo which had anticipated 458.927MW for Wednesday had it cut to 50MW by 1pm as efforts were ongoing to revive the national grid.
Eko DisCo had 70MW, Benin and Ikeja DisCos had 50MW respectively and Ibadan DisCo got 40MW.
Some DisCos also informed their customers about the outage which would be felt especially during the public holiday.
According to a statement by Kaduna Electric by the Head, Corporate Communication, Abdulazeez Abdullahi, the collapse occurred at 11:01 am on Wednesday.
“Dear esteemed customers, we regret to inform you that the power outage currently being experienced across our franchise – Kaduna, Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara states – is as a result of the collapse of the national grid.
“The collapse occurred at about 11:01 am this morning. Power supply shall be restored across our franchise as soon as the grid is restored by the TCN team,” it stated.
The TCN team was observed to be working on restoring the grid, according to the ISO online monitor.
