Nationwide blackout as power grid collapses

Nigeria witnessed another round of widespread blackout across the country on Tuesday as the national power grid collapsed again, making it the third grid collapse in about five days.

Power generation on the grid crashed from a peak of 3,594.60 megawatts at midnight to 42.7MW by midday of Tuesday.

It was observed that at noon, only the Delta Power plant was operational on the grid, contributing 41MW, while Afam generated 1.7MW.

On Friday, The PUNCH reported that the Federal Government had explained that the nationwide blackout witnessed the preceding day, being Thursday, was due to a fire incident and an explosion on the Kainji/Jebba 330kV line 2.

Power consumers, however, kicked against the never-ending excuses of the government as regards power generation and supply in Nigeria, despite privatising the generation and distribution arms of the sector since November 2013.

The PUNCH had earlier reported on Thursday that there was widespread blackout across the country following the total collapse of Nigeria's electricity grid early Thursday morning.

The report stated that the grid collapsed totally around 12.40am on September 14, 2023, leading to the massive loss of supply to power distributors nationwide.

Multiple sources in the power sector, as well electricity distribution companies had confirmed the development, as the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company Plc had issued a notice titled, 'Notice of Total System Collapse."

In the notice, it said, "The EEDC wishes to inform her esteemed customers of a total system collapse which occurred\xa0 at 12:40am today, September 14, 2023.

"This has resulted to the loss of supply currently being experienced across the network. Due to this development, all our interface TCN (Transmission Company of Nigeria) stations are out of supply, and we are unable to provide service to our customers in Abia, Anambra,\xa0 Ebonyi,\xa0 Enugu and Imo states.