Nigeria’s power sector is likely to witness stability as the biggest existential threat of the industry, which is exponential grid collapse is possibly going to be addressed
a fresh model that is intended to support and enable energy developers to provide improved electricity services in Nigeria.
This follows a report by RMI that points to a new Renewable Embedded Generation (REG) business initiative.
Reports have shown that Nigeria’s national electricity grid has collapsed more than 200 times in the last nine years, regularly resulting in widespread blackouts.
The grid collapsed twice in March 2022 within 48 hours which according to ecpert could be attributed many factors.
Some of these include insufficiently trained personnel, deficiency in local manufacturing, poor utility performance, theft of grid equipment, weather, gas supply, insufficient funding and the age of grid infrastructure.
Sunday Oduntan, the Executive Director, Research and Advocacy of the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distribution Companies, ANED, in a conversation with National Economy stressed that the problem with the country’s grid system is because it is radial in nature and lacks flexibility such that when anything happens along the line there will be total collapse.
The Nigerian national electricity grid is a network of generation companies, distribution companies and the Transmission Company of Nigeria, he said and where there is gap in supply and transmission the grid suffers collapse.
Nigeria’s electricity generation mix is made up mostly of gas combined cycle plants followed by gas open cycle and at the lower end of the contribution scale are large hydropower plants and tiny portion from solar PV.
As a background, the national power grid, a network of electricity transmission lines connecting generating stations to loads across the entire country, is designed to operate within certain stability limits in terms of voltage (330kV+5 per cent) and frequency (50Hz+5 per cent).
Whenever the grid operates out of these stability ranges, it becomes unstable; power quality decreases and leads to wide-scale supply disruptions, resulting in grid collapse and blackouts.
However, the unlocking Renewable Embedded Generation in Nigeria, report is based on a feasibility study supported by a grant from the UK Partnering for Accelerated Climate Transitions Program (UK PACT).
The report posits embedded generation could give Discos a way to improve their supply of electricity to customers without relying on the problematic national grid and at the same time maintain control of their franchise area.
Unlocking Renewable Embedded Generation in Nigeria will be of particular interest to Discos which struggle to take advantage of embedded generation in Nigeria. This is mostly because of concerns around their ability to pay for electricity purchased.
Nigeria’s national grid suffers frequent and extensive power outages because of outdated infrastructure and insufficient capacity. Electricity users supplement their power supply with self-generation, mainly through diesel generators. These are expensive to run, create air pollution and contribute to the country’s growing CO2 emissions profile.
Suleiman Babamanu, Nigeria Director of RMI’s Africa Energy , says reducing customer reliance on expensive self-generation means the REG business model would decrease the overall cost of electricity and limit exposure to volatile fossil fuel prices.
“As donors, investors and governments increasingly seek to align their investment portfolios with net-zero targets, we strongly encourage them to support integration and scaling of renewable energies into the grid through this model,” said Babamanu.
“Increased diesel prices [because of the Ukraine conflict’s effect on global fuel prices] improve the business case for REG and the energy transition plan will hopefully encourage more investment in such initiatives,” said Sakhi Shah, RMI Africa Energy Program senior associate told ESI Africa.
Lion’s Head Global Partners (LHGP) assisted RMI by establishing investor needs and how to structure the business model to ensure investors were comfortable with the framework. They also helped facilitate workshops and reviewed key inputs for the financial modelling.
“In addition, Lion’s Head also engaged and cultivated relationships with key financial sector stakeholders as well as obtained agreement/alignment with the business model to ensure the successful delivery of the project,” said Shah.
Using the REG business model, the Disco would be responsible for initiating a project by way of identifying a site and collecting preliminary data. Then it has to procure a developer to execute the project, Shah explained.
“In terms of distribution of roles, the Disco is responsible for project initiation and development procurement and then a developer comes in to lead project development and construction. As for ownership, the developer owns all generation assets while the Disco owns the distribution assets.
“Partners and contractors can assist the Discos to do data collection for initial pilots, and ongoing capacity building will mean Discos have improved ability to collect data going forward,” she said.
The study suggests an adequate blend of solar PV, battery storage and thermal gas generation in the model increases electricity supply for all customers. It should also enable 24/7 reliable power to end users.
The model potentially presents an attractive investment opportunity for developers and climate-aligned financiers. The model’s collaborative approach means access for a large customer pool for the distributed energy resources (DER) developers. It also means significant investment opportunities for financiers.
The REG business model has the potential to scale embedded generation and incorporate distributed energy resources into Nigeria’s grid to improve reliability.
Next up would be executing demonstration projects to showcase the REG business model. RMI has already identified pilot projects to implement in the next phase.
RMI expects proving the REG business model works will happen much faster than setting up their Commercial Undergrid Minigrids Project. This is because there is now more support and momentum for implementation.
“Embedded generation is not a completely new business model and there are some projects in operation, unlike the Undergrid Minigrid which was the first of its kind.
“In addition, since Mokoloki was developed, Discos have gained more experience with supporting DER projects, there are more investment funds available for clean energy DERs, and developers are more experienced so projects can move a little bit faster,” said Shah.
Though RMI have not yet researched the matter, she said there could be potential to adapt the business model to other countries.
In some situations, the amount of electricity supplied to the grid is lower than the electricity demand and when this occurs, an automatic load shedding plan is activated, but if this fails, the generators switch off one after another until there is a complete collapse of the national grid, he explained.
In Nigeria, the system mismatch occurs frequently because demand is regularly beyond available power allocated to distribution companies at certain periods and this is in addition to the high transmission and distribution losses.
Although the transmission company of Nigeria, TCN, often attempts to bring the mismatch under control, it doesn’t always succeed. In some instances, sensitive generating units trip as they cannot cope with additional loads. If cascaded tripping continues, the whole power grid eventually loses supply.
Oduntan, also mentioned inability of the transmission company to wheel electricity from generators to distributors, archaic and weak national grid, poor utility performance and theft/vandalisation of grid equipment, insufficient funding to upgrade from analogue to a smart grid and extraordinary transmission and distribution losses (up to 18 per cent , with an average above 8 per cent ) due to moribund infr astructure.
Offering some tips, he said these challenges can be addressed by optimally stepping up electricity generation while the Transmission Company of Nigeria can upgrade and increase transformer capacity.
He said that the distribution companies recently improved the network and are willing to take up demand from consumers and this can reduce the issue of load rejections.
He also urged the government should speed up efforts to decentralise the national grid through mini-grids driven by renewable energy sources like solar photovoltaic and wind turbines.
