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Blackout: Shiroro, Sapele power plants shut

By on April 7, 2016

The nation’s electricity woes worsened on Tuesday as two additional power generating plants were shut down, bringing the total number of plants not generating any megawatts of electricity to 10.

The two shut plants are Shiroro Power Station in Niger State and Sapele II in Delta State, industry data obtained by our correspondent showed.

Shiroro, whose capacity was put at 600MW, was said to have seen its unit 411G1 tripped on emergency shutdown on the 86ES lockout relay; units 411G2 and 3 out for under water repair work; and unit 411G4 out on maintenance.

The Sapele II, built under the National Integrated Power Project, with its capacity put at 225MW, has four units. The GT1 was shut down for maintenance, GT3 out due to work by the Nigerian Gas Company at the gas station, while the GT2 and 4 units are out as a result of gas constraints.

Total national power generation stood at 2,774.2MW on Tuesday, down from 3,657.5MW on March 31. Generation from Egbin, the nation’s biggest power station, was limited to 415MW due to gas constraints, down from 1,085MW on March 15.

Shell’s Afam VI power plant generated the highest megawatts of electricity at 418MW as of 6am, the data showed.

The slide in power generation has worsened the blackout being experienced in many parts of the country as many consumers complained of outages lasting for hours on end.

The PUNCH had on Friday reported exclusively that eight of the nation’s power plants were completely idle on Thursday, with significant reduction in generation from others, including Egbin, which is located in Lagos.

The plants, which did not generate any megawatts of electricity included Sapele, Delta State, whose installed capacity was put at 240MW; Olorunsogo II in Ogun State, with a capacity of 625MW; Rivers IPP (180MW) and Trans-Amadi (75MW), both in Rivers State.

Others were Geregu I in Kogi; Afam IV & V in Rivers, and A.E.S and Asco, whose installed capacity were not given.

Sapele’s units were said to be shut due to gas constraints, tripping, maintenance and major overhaul, among other reasons.

The Rivers IPP’s unit GT1 was out due to gas constraints, while Trans-Amadi’s GT1 and 4 units were out due to line constraints; GT2 due to gas constraints and GT3 undergoing maintenance.

According to the data, there was no communication on A.E.S, while Asco’s unit GT1 was out due to a fire outbreak. Olorunsogo’s units GT1 to 4 and ST2 were shut due to gas constraints, and ST1 for maintenance.

Geregu’s three units were shut due to outage and to enable them to undergo a major overhaul and maintenance, while a unit of Afam IV & V had been de-commissioned and scrapped; four were out due to blade failure and two due to burnt generator transformer, among others.

 

[Punch]