Recent improvement in the power supply situation in the country has been hinged on the generation of over 1000 megawatts of electricity into the national grid by Egbin Power Plc. Giving an update on the activities of the company in Lagos, the Chairman of the plant, Mr. Kola Adesina, recalled that this was the first time since inception of the power plant that it will achieve the feat.
According to him, the feat was made possible because of the continuing investment and upgrade activities on the plant by the new investors, Sahara Power Group and Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO), noting that eight years ago, the plant hit the 1000mw mark for barely two hours and never attained it again until now. In a statement by the Head, Public Communications of Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), Mr. Alex Okoh, said, prior to the privatisation and handover of the plant in November 2013, Egbin averaged generation of below 500MW due to the dismal state of its six units, which at its lowest point, only two of the six units were operational.
The Chairman said that prior to the privatisation of the plant in November 2013, most of the auxiliaries like the demineralisation plant were not functional, spare parts necessary for plant operation and preventive maintenance were unavailable and that most of the equipment were obsolete.
He said since takeover, the new owners have embarked on total overhaul of units 4, 5 and 1, allowing the units to peak at 220MW each, which is the installed capacity and that the plant “has never undergone any major overhaul in its 30 years of operation.”
Adesina said Unit 6 of the plant, which has been moribund for 10 years has been successfully restored while Turbine Vibration Monitoring Systems, which assist in regulating the speed of the turbine in the event of vibration to avoid a catastrophic failure have been replaced.
The firm’s chief executive explained that with the successful restoration of Unit 6 and the overhauling of the units halfway complete, there was an increase of 50 per cent in generation and a drastic decrease in unscheduled shut downs.
On the medium term investment plans, the Chairman said the major overhaul of Units 2, 3 & 6 in 2016 will complete the overhaul plan scheduled until the next scheduled overhaul in 2019.
While noting that the feat signposts the unfolding success of the privatisation process and power sector reform in Nigeria, Adesina attributed the achievement partly to the direct intervention of the Federal Government in its determination to resolve the power crisis, which has resulted in recent improvement in gas supply.