CITIZENS COMPASS —THERE was a nationwide power outage in Nigeria on Thursday, September 14, 2023 which paralysed commercial activities all through day.
The outage was as a result of the National grid which collapsed the previous day after a downpour.
The West African nation’s electricity distribution companies said the country’s electrical grid collapsed due to technical failures.
The outage affected all of Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
The grid has collapsed multiple times, and it was not clear when power would be restored.
The Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC), which supplies electricity to southeastern Nigeria, issued a statement announcing a “total system” collapse. “Due to this development … we are unable to provide service to our customers,” company spokesperson Emeka Ezeh said.
Such power failures are common in Nigeria which battles with dilapidated energy infrastructure that has caused frequent power outages.
“Power supply shall be restored as soon as the national grid is powered back,” the Kaduna Electricity Distribution Company, which supplies power to parts of northern Nigeria, said in a statement Thursday.
Oil-rich but energy-poor Nigeria generates a daily average of 4,000 megawatts of electricity — some of which it is unable to distribute — for a population of more than 210 million people, far from the 30,000 megawatts a day authorities have said it needs.
The inadequate power supply leaves millions of residents relying on gasoline-powered generators for electricity. However, gasoline prices have more than doubled this year after the government ended decades-long subsidies, and many households and businesses have struggled to find an alternative source of power supply.
The latest collapse came barely two weeks after the controversial celebration of 400 days of stable or incident-free operations by the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN.
Why grid collapsed—TCN
The Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, blamed the collapse on a fire incident on Kainji/Jebba 330KV Line 2, adding that the incident is being investigated, with “the view to forestalling future occurrence and invariably further strengthening the grid.”
A statement by TCN General Manager, Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah, stated that “grid restoration nationwide is in progress and has reached advanced stages, with power supply now available in the West, North-Central, South, East, and a large portion of the northern parts of the country.
The power supply restoration is sequel to the total grid collapse, which occurred at about 12.35 am, this morning (yesterday), causing outages nationwide, after over 421 days of consistent grid stability… “
