The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has reported that Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company (IBEDC) topped the metering distribution chart as of June 30, 2022 with 828,061 metered customers, representing a 38.67% performance during the period under review
It also disclosed that Ibadan DisCo was followed by the Ikeja DisCo, which recorded 686,705 metered customers with a 52.89% performance, and that Abuja DisCo came third with 710,870 metered customers with a 61% performance.
According to the latest report by the commission on customer metering nationwide by the DisCos, since the updated Meter Asset Provider (MAP) and the National Mass Metering Programme (NMMP) regulations of 2021, the DisCos have been recording improved performance in the distribution of end-use customer meters.
Similarly, the report reflected that on DisCo-by-DisCo basis, Abuja, Eko, Enugu, Ibadan, Ikeja, Kaduna, Port Harcourt, and Yola DisCos recorded increments of 31.96%, 98.28%, 62.91%, 40.01% 154.75%, 157.65%, 8.72% and 100% from the numbers of customers metered as of Q1 2022.
The NERC data further showed that there were 12,643,630 registered energy customers in the country out of which 4,898,721 had been metered at the end of June 2022, with a metering performance of 38.74%.
Earlier, the industry regulatory commission had reported that as of the end September 2021, registered energy customers stood at 12.78 million, of which only 4.77million (37.3% of the identified customers) were metered, leaving the unmetered population at 8.01million customers (62.7% of the registered customers).
Industry analysts attributed the decline in registered energy customers between the end of September 2021 and June 30, 2022 to damaged meters and constraints being faced by the power transmission and distribution issues recorded at the point of data collection.
As part of its efforts to bridge the meter gap in the energy sector, the NERC said it was engaging the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), World Bank, African Development Bank (AfDB) and other fund-providing institutions to accelerate the production of meters for the next round of the NMMP.
