The Nigerian government through the Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC) has signed a Power Purchase Agreement with utility companies to distribute a total of about 250MW across the country.
The power sale transactions have been signed since the inception of the ‘Light Up Nigeria’ programme currently running under Vice President Shettima.
The Disco offtakers include, Eko Electricity Distribution Plc, Compagnie d’Energie Electrique du Togo, Sunflag Steel Industries Limited, Lagos, Wewood Limited, Omotosho, Ondo State, APLE Electric Limited, Pulkit Alloy & Steel Limited, Lagos.
Others are ABV Utility Limited, Lagos, Ayingba Independent Electricity Distribution Network Limited, Ondo South, Avatar New Energy Limited, Phoenix Steel Mills Limited, Agbara Industrial Area, and Ota & Sagamu Interchange.
NDPHC said the goal of the programme was to sell the current capacity available and develop more, and that the power generation projects were all funded through the Excess Crude Account properly appropriated by the Nigerian government and the States between 2005 and 2009.
The PUNCH reports that NDPHC’s installed capacity so far is 4000MW and currently has 10 power plants, however, it revealed that Calabar is the only plant with a full gas supply.
Despite the foregoing achievements, NDPHC said its operations are hampered by a number of systemic challenges which have significantly affected its cash flow.
The company listed some of the challenges as; transmission constraints, gas supply and transportation constraints to guarantee generation up to TCN-allocated evacuation capacity of 975MW, let alone full capacity of its power plants.