LAGOS – Mr Frank Edozien, Special Assistant to the Minister of Power on Gas, has said the Federal Government had committed much effort to ensure stable power supply in Nigeria.
Edozien told newsmen in Lagos that government had embarked on various projects in thermal, hydro and solar energy.
He said that some projects had been completed, while others were ongoing, adding that power generation currently stood at 4,500 megawatts but because of downtime and other hitches, output was 3,500mw.
The special assistant on gas reassured Nigerians that government was totally committed to providing stable power.
According to him, government’s activities in rural electrification aimed at achieving its programme was tagged “Operation Light up Rural Nigeria.’’
He lamented the challenges of vandalism of gas pipelines which impeded efforts to achieving reasonable power output.
“When the current administration came on board, the power facilities were delivering barely 2,800 megawatts.
“And in fact, the actual daily average didn’t reach 2,500 megawatts but today, we have hit 4,500 megawatts and I think it is a milestone by any standard.
“Electricity is not something you can do overnight, it takes time for any of the projects to really mature.
“On a daily average, because of all kinds of downtime, load-shedding, among others, we have exceeded 3,500 megawatts which is well
in excess of 1,000 megawatts over what President Goodluck Jonathan inherited.
“But we have been picking up at least for now apart from vandalism, we have picked up to 4,500 megawatts and we have capacity to do more than that,’’ he said.
Edozien said that government was working very hard to ensure the availability of gas, adding that the National Integrated Power Project (NIPP) inherited by the Jonathan administration was virtually moribund.
He said that it was when he became the Vice-President that he started wooing and encouraging the states to come on board and ensure that the NIPP didn’t quite die completely.
The special assistant said that when completed, all of the 10 plants under NIPP would supply 4,500mw approximately to the grid.
