The Federal Government has approved plans to build new eastern and western electricity grids as part of efforts to tackle Nigeria’s recurring power grid collapses, with the benefits expected to emerge within two to three years.
The Minister of Power, Joseph Tegbe, disclosed this at the recent HBSAN energy conference in Lagos, saying the government was preparing to begin procurement for the projects.
He said the initiative would strengthen the country’s transmission infrastructure, particularly along the Lagos and Abuja corridors, which he identified as critical to resolving a significant portion of Nigeria’s electricity challenges.
Tegbe said the government had also commenced a nationwide technical audit of electricity infrastructure to identify faults, assess the condition of existing facilities and determine areas requiring urgent intervention.
According to him, the exercise is aimed at ensuring that government investments target the actual causes of transmission failures rather than replacing equipment that is not responsible for the problems.
“We have started a technical audit across the entire country to say where do we have issues, and what issues specifically do we have. I don’t want to fix transformer issues where I have conductor and relay problems. I don’t want to fix insulators where the challenges I actually have are towers,” he said.
The minister added that the audit would be completed within weeks, after which the government would prioritise areas requiring immediate attention.
He said Nigeria had been divided into three energy zones, with the Lagos and Abuja corridors accounting for a significant share of the country’s electricity demand.
“We have clustered Nigeria into three energy zones. The first one is the one that demands 50 per cent. If you fix Lagos and you fix the Abuja corridors, you’ve solved more than half of the problem of Nigeria,” Tegbe said.
He added that improving operational efficiency alone would not be enough without expanding the transmission network.
“The President has approved that we commence the process of building out the grid: East and Western grid. We’re going through the procurement process, but it’s something you’ll see the benefits in two to three years,” he said.
Tegbe attributed the persistent challenges in the transmission sector partly to ageing infrastructure, noting that some facilities had been in service for decades without adequate replacement.
He said several transmission towers and lines dated back to the era of the Electricity Company of Nigeria (ECN), which operated before the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA).
“This government has inherited a problem of 50 years. Before I became the Minister of Power, honestly, I used to think that everybody in the power sector just didn’t know their left from right. But the reality is, some of the towers have gone down with some of the transmission lines there,” he said.
The minister said his visits to some facilities revealed infrastructure bearing the ECN logo, underscoring the age of the equipment the government now needs to rehabilitate or replace.
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