Contrary to earlier claims that pipelines vandalism had been the reason behind the shortage of gas supplies to major power plants across the country, for more than one month of no vandalism, some key power plants have remained idle because of gas supply shortage.
The nation generates most of its electricity from gas-fired power plants, while output from hydro-power plants make up about 30 per cent of total generation.
Currently, out of 26 power plants, about eight are in serious need of gas, thus leading to massive drop in generation.
Over the weekend, Olorunsogo power plant and other six plants in parts of the federation are suffering gas shortage and lower power supplies.
A report, weekend from the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and Housing has shown that Olorunsogo power plant and others are now hobbled by gas shortage not caused by vandalism but what is yet to be disclosed.
The report also showed that the nation’s power grid recorded 10 collapses in the first quarter of the year, as the quantum of spinning reserve aimed at forestalling such occurrence remained low.
The Ministry was silent on the actual cause of the gas short supplies.
The total national power generation, which stood at 4,176.3 megawatts on March 31, fell to 3,366MW on Thursday, April 6, exacerbating the outage being experienced by households and businesses.
The Ministry also noted that electricity generation from Egbin, the nation’s biggest power station, stood at 178MW on Thursday, down from 1,085MW on March 15, 2016. The plant has an installed capacity of 1,320MW, consisting of six units of 220MW each.
Undistributed generation capacity increased from 1,779.5MW on March 31 to 2,495.1MW on April 6, with 2,405.1MW caused by gas constraint and 90MW as a result of water management/maintenance.
Apart from Olorunsogo II in Ogun State, other power plants not generating are any megawatt of electricity were Alaoji II in Abia State; Afam IV & V; Trans-Amadi; AES; ASCO and Rivers IPP.
