FG Earmarks $4bn for Power Construction, Transmission

Prof Chinedu Nebo, Power Minister

In its quest to provide adequate power supply the federal government has earmarked $4billion for the construction and rehabilitation of transmission infrastructure in the country.

Also,  some of the major power projects that  attracted transmission such as the Mambila Hydro Power project, are to be executed under a public private partnership  (PPP) arrangement.

Both the transmission and project consultancy would cost  $6.4billion, the counterpart fund of $1.6billion had already been provided by the government.

This was as the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) yesterday said it would continue to kick and push electricity distribution companies (DISCOS) in Nigeria’s Electricity Supply Industry (NESI) to improve on services to eligible customers within their distribution networks until such a time that it was satisfied with the condition of their service delivery in the industry.

The Vice-President, Namadi Sambo, disclosed this yesterday, when he received the Vice-President of the State Grid Corporation of China, Mr. Cheng Wei, at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

He assured the corporation of fair competition in the planned transmission projects in the country.

He said he was  impressed with the experience, capacity and the capability of the company and noted that the company was coming at the right time when the transformation agenda was set to provide adequate power supply to the country.

According to a statement issued by his Senior Special Adviser and Publicity, Umar Sani, "he (Sambo) stated that the sum of $4billion has been earmarked for the construction/rehabilitation of transmission infrastructure in the countrys adding that very recently vacancy for consultancy services was advertised and the company was advised to participate by responding to the advertisement

"The vice-president said the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) and the Niger Delta Power Holding Company were the two companies that would implement the projects with the active participation and supervision of the ministry of power.

“Sambo added that some of the major power projects that would attract transmission include the Mambila Hydro Power project to be executed under a PPP arrangement and that both the transmission and project consultancy would cost $6.4billion and that the counterpart fund of $1.6billion had already been provided by the government for such an important project."

The statement further noted that the vice-president "catalogued other projects that would have transmission which include; the Zungeru 700mw hydro power project, the Gurara Phase II Hydro power project due to be completed at the end of the year and the Itisi Hydropower project, adding that government planned to generate 20,000mw by 2018 on completion of these and other projects."

Earlier, the group, which was chaperoned by the Chairman Integrated Energy Mr. Olatunde Ayeni, invited the Vice President of the SGCC for Powerpoint presentation on the capacity, asset, revenue base and accumulated experiences of the company.

"State Grid of China Corporation has an annual revenue base of about $300billion they intended to set up a company that would fabricate and eventually manufacture electrical equipment as well as provide training for staff on manufacture and installation of electrical equipments.

"The company was proud of its place in the provision of ultra high voltage technology, Power Grid Construction Field and Transmission," Ayeni said in the statement.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of NERC, Dr. Sam Amadi, disclosed in Abuja that the commission had instituted a regular peer review mechanism to monitor, report and compare the operational activities of the distribution companies, vis-à-vis electricity distribution services within the various distribution networks.

Amadi who spoke with journalists at the inauguration of officials of electricity customers’ forum offices of Jos, Yola and Benin distribution networks that part of the review mechanism for the distribution companies includes periodic mandatory reports on recorded level and number of power outages, service providers’ response to such outages and consumer complaints among others, explained that the performance of each of the distribution networks was reviewed based on the report and with which the commission employs in getting the service provider’s commitment to improved service delivery.

The commission had in March this year written to the distribution companies to improve on service delivery to electricity consumers in view of the expiration of the three-month initial grace period granted them to settle in from the power privatisation exercise.

But when queried on their response to the directive so far, Amadi said: “Improvement grows up, our job as a regulator is to keep on pushing the utilities to higher level of service delivery and so when we say improve and they give us feedback that they have improved but the consumers come back to complain, we need to go back to ask them to improve.

“When we say they should improve and they report that they have improved, we carry out our monitoring and discover that they have not met up with their obligations or improved marginally, then we come back and score them.

We have started a peer review mechanism in the commission with our meetings with the CEOs; we try to see what they have done and say yes, you have tried but it is not good enough, you need to improve in certain areas and this is not because they are not obeying but because they are working with constraints that we need to recognise,” Amadi added.

He further stated: “What we are trying to do is that while we improve the environment within which they work with better regulation, more gas supply and helping them recover their investments, we also want to push them to do better in those areas and so as we are improving their operational environments, we are also pushing them to benchmark their performance.”

Similarly, the chairman noted that the commission’s recent regulations on enforcement now grants it the power to legally penalise errant behaviours brought to it by electricity forum offices in each of the distribution networks.
He explained that the commission would within the regulation act on any judgment delivered by the forum offices which stand as appellate courts for settlement of disputes between service providers and customers.

On irregularities in metering of electricity consumers, Amadi said: “NERC’s position on metering has not changed even before the conclusion of privatisation. We had emphasised in MYTO-2 the responsibilities of discos to meter customers which is world best practices and we also recognise that metering is capital intensive and there be will financial issues around metering. (Source - ThisDay)