The Niger Delta Power Holding Company Limited (NDPHC), has disclosed that it spent over $1.2 billion in the projects and handed over them to the DisCos, with an understanding that the money would be refunded by the Discos.
The company stated that the handed-over projects to the DisCos were part of the over 374 projects it invested in so far the distribution subsector of the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry (NESI) to boost power supply nationwide’
Making this disclosure while speaking on the theme ‘Maximising National Integrated Projects’ at the 8th Nigeria Energy Forum, the company’s Executive Director, Networks, Ifeoluwa Oyedele, explained that while the projects had been handed over to the Discos, legal assets transfer was ongoing and awaiting a valuation exercise by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC).
He identified some of the executed projects as including the 337 33/11kV lines, 25,281 25kVA and 50kVA CSP transformers, 199 distribution transformers (100, 200, 300, 500 KVA) of 108MVA, 2,256km of 33kV lines and 4,670km of 11kV lines.
Oyedele confirmed that the company had also undertaken over 121 transmission line and substation projects in the power transmission subsector and carried out expansion works in 34 substations of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) nationwide, including those located in Enugu, Jos, and Owerri.
According to him, other projects executed in the transmission sub-sector include a total of 51 330/132kV substations with 6,450MVA transmission capacity, 132/33kV substations with 3,160MVA transmission capacity, 2,703km 330kV of lines, 765km of 132kV lines, while 25 other projects were said to be currently ongoing.
The industry expert said: “These accomplishments led to a complete transformation of the hitherto radial Nigerian grid into what it is today, a substantially looped grid that provides substantial redundancy to power flow around the grid. This was completely unavailable prior to NIPP.”
In addition, Oyedele hinted that some power generation and operations challenges as they related to transmission constraints, pointing out that the NDPHC had an installed capacity of about 4,000 megawatts which was mostly available, except for maintenance outages.
He pointed out, however, that the capacity was being “dispatched at about 700MW on average by the System Operator for reasons ascribed to load rejection by the DisCos.”
