Gas constraint, low demand from DisCos force nine power plants to shut down

Nine of Nigeria’s 27 power plants did not generate any megawatt of electricity on Thursday.

This left a total of 2,079 megawatts of unutilised generation capacity.

The data from the Nigerian Electricity System Operator as of 6am on Thursday showed that the plants included five of those built under the National Integrated Power Project.

They are Alaoji, Olorunsogo I, Omotosho II, Ihovbor and Gbarain.

Other plants that did not produce any megawatt of electricity from the Independent Power Producers are Afam IV & V, Ibom Power, AES and ASCO.

The data cited low load demand by the distribution companies; blade failure; maintenance; gas constraint; frequency response and rupturing of gas pipeline, among others for the shutdown.

At Alaoji, GT1 and 3 were out due to low load demand by the DisCos; GT2 was out due to high air inlet differential pressure, and GT4 was awaiting spare part.

At Afam IV & V, GT11 and GT1 were decommissioned and scrapped; GT13, 14 and 16 were out on blade failure; GT19 and 20 were awaiting overhaul; GT17 was out due to low load demand by the DisCos, and GT 18 out due to gas constraint.

GT1 was out on inspection in Olorunsogo; GT2 and 3 were out due to gas constrain.

Three units at Omotosho and two units in Ihovbor were shut down due to gas constraint and low load demand by DisCos while one unit at Gbarain was shut down due to the rupturing of the gas pipeline.

At Ibom Power, GT1 was out on inlet guide vane problem; GT2 was out due to a fire outbreak on the control panel, and GT3 was out due to low load demand by Discos.

The data also showed that AES has been out of production since September 2014, while ASCO’s ST1 was out due to leakage in the furnace.

The peak power generation was 5,098.90MW.

Total power generation in the country was 3,269.6MW. as of 6am on Thursday, up from 3,074.6MW the previous day. The peak energy generated was 5,093.90.

The system operator put the nation’s installed capacity of available units at 6,403 and generation capacity of available units at 5,735.