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Switch to energy bulbs – FG tells consumers

By on October 27, 2014

Over 1,200 megawatts of electricity is consumed by incandescent light bulbs, otherwise known as screw-in or filament light bulbs, which are widely used across Nigeria, the Federal Government has said.

It said the continued use of incandescent bulbs was costing the country a huge amount of power and urged Nigerians to switch over to energy saving bulbs so as to release the over 1,200MW of electricity trapped by the filament bulbs.

The Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, who made the position of government known in a presentation in Abuja, also decried the massive loss in power sector caused by the activities of criminals vandalising power installations.

Nebo, in the presentation, which was obtained by our correspondent on Friday, stated that renewable energy and energy efficiency policy were being pursued by the ministry in a bid to release the quantum electricity.

He said, “The policy will soon be something that Nigerians will adopt because we have reached almost a concluding stage of presentation to the Federal Executive Council. And we are also working on energy efficiency and conservation because we see this as a cheap way of generating energy.

“If we were to change every bulb in Nigeria, for instance, to light emitting diode bulbs that are energy efficient, Nigeria will have more than 1,200MW of power released. The cost of replacing this is an infinitely tiny portion of what it will cost the country to build a power plant that will generate 1,200MW. So, energy saving and energy efficiency is actually another way of generating electricity.”

The power minister said the policy was already at an advanced stage and would go a long way in addressing the expectations of the government in the short, medium, and long terms in developing the country’s renewable energy capacity.

On the vandalism of power installations, Nebo said the ministry was recently informed of an incident in which vandals melted down a transformer worth over N5m and sold it for about N45,000.

He said, “Young men and women get transformers, melt them down and sell them. The last one we heard, they sold a transformer that would have cost about N5m or more for N45,000 after they had melted everything down and they shared the money among themselves. So, you can imagine what happens when people are ignorant.

“The transmission network is also suffering from the same demon of vandals as the oil and gas infrastructure network. Transmission lines are made with copper which can be sold in the standard market at premium price. Vandals risk their lives to climb electrified poles to cut transmission lines down so that they profit from the destruction either by selling the copper or by the satisfaction of disrupting power supply in the country. This is not supposed to be.”

He noted that to help minimise this risk, the government had procured GIS-based security systems to assist in monitoring transmission lines and poles, gas pipelines, and other critical infrastructure.

The minister also noted that Nigeria’s transmission infrastructure was outdated while many of the equipment had been in poor shape due to neglect of maintenance during the defunct NEPA/PHCN era.

Nebo said, “The existing transmission network which currently consists of 330KV and 132KV power lines is weak with high energy losses. Nigeria has one of the highest transmission losses in the world. This is partly because the average age of the transmission equipment is over 30 years.

“One of the jobs Manitoba Hydro International has to do is to fix these issues in a timely fashion to allow for energy to be efficiently dispatched through the system to the distribution networks.

“The transmission network is the life-blood of the entire electricity ecosystem and currently it is proving to be a weak link in the Nigerian electricity supply industry. Transmission is the only domain in the electricity supply value chain that still remains under the control of the Federal Government.”

He noted that improving electricity transmission had not been easy even under Manitoba’s leadership, adding that the country’s obsolete transmission infrastructure had been a major issue hampering the current reform in the sector.

 

[Punch]

One Comment

  1. Matthew Ikponmwonba

    October 27, 2014 at 7:46 am

    Is it now that Nigeria is just waking up from her slumber ? From onset, this has been crystal clear, most visible to the blind. The filament bulbs consume more voltage especially when it’s a highly rated in terms of watt. But Govt should also live up to its statutory responsibilities by ensuring high quality standard from the manufacturers of the low-energy bulb popularly known as china bulb.