According to a variety of news reports, the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) have said that projects currently being executed by the company would boost the national power grid by an additional 4,000MW when completed.
Sule Abdulaziz, acting managing director at TCN, shared that the company had acquired a new office for its Project Implementation Units (PIUs), which were created to enhance the delivery of projects. The PIUs are responsible for adding the additional megawatts to the grid.
The new office for the PIUs houses four project units financed by donor agencies including the World Bank, Agence Française de Developpment (AFD), the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
The PIUs were specialised units of TCN that would ensure critical transmission line and substation projects were delivered within specification, quality and timeframe.
Abdulaziz added that the project units were already implementing projects that would enhance TCN’s 8,100MW grid capacity.
“Management is also making such efforts in the mainstream TCN, which has enabled the company to successfully transmit successive all-time generation peaks achieved in the power sector, the latest being 5,801MW,” he said.
The general manager and coordinator of the PIU office at TCN, Joseph Ciroma, commented on a number of projects being supervised by the PIUs. These include a greenfield AFD-funded Abuja high voltage transmission feeding scheme.
“The project will bring an additional 330kV transmission line through Lafia, bringing to three, the source of bulk power transmission into Abuja,” Ciroma said.
“The additional bulk power supply into Abuja will ensure reliability and availability of power supply in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT),” he stressed.
Unpacking the TCN grid upgrade
The World Bank project unit, according to Ciroma, will address a nationwide transmission upgrade, which will impact 30 power transformers over the course of the upgrade.
Ciroma said further that 30MVA transformers would be replaced with 60MVA and 100MVA depending on the planned capacity upgrade for the substation. “The 30MVA transformers that will be removed will be installed in areas with lower electricity demand. This will invariably, add to the capacity of the network.”
“The African Development Bank project unit is working on strengthening the 330kV Alaoji (Abia State) to Onitsha (Anambra State) transmission line.
”The line currently evacuates only 400MW of power but after the line is re-conductored [sic] its capacity will increase to 1,200MW which is three times the current capacity.”
He continued that the AfDB will provide funding for a new transmission line from Benin to Delta to increase power evacuation on that route from 400MW to 1,200MW.
An additional 1,200MW capacity transmission line will complement the 400MW capacity line running from Kaduna to Kano, according to Ciroma.
Ciroma also said that through JICA-funded project unit targets transmission projects in Lagos and Ogun States, TCN would build four 330kV substations, two 132/33kV substations and four 120MW capacity 330kV transmission lines.
These lines would also connect the West African Power Pool (WAPP) to enable Nigeria to export more power when the projects were completed.
TCN had recently installed a new 60MVA, 132/33kV power transformer in its Kubwa substation, Abuja. The new power transformer radiated three feeders, including the Usuma Dam, Dawaki and Deidei feeders.
“The feeders will make more bulk electricity available for Abuja Disco to take to its consumers in the areas concerned,” he said.
