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Power restored, we had temporary grid disturbance - TCN reacts to blackout

The nation was once again thrown into darkness on Saturday morning after power generation to the national grid dropped to zero megawatts.
Let's get smart about our power grid.artpartner-images/Getty Images
Let's get smart about our power grid.artpartner-images/Getty Images

The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) said it had restored power to the national grid after a ''temporary disturbance'' that lasted for some hours.

Nigerians woke up to another report of power grid collapse on Saturday, October 19, 2024, the third incident in the space of one week.

The disturbance occurred around 8:16 am when power generation dropped to 00MW, with many states reporting blackouts.

The nationwide blackout comes four days after the grid tripped off as it was being restored after an earlier collapse on Monday.

Checks confirmed that power generation stood at 3,042 megawatts at 8 am and peaked at 3,968MW at 7 am.

However, generation dropped to 47MW as of 9 am, with allocation to power distribution companies standing at 0.00MW at the time of filing this report.

However, data gleaned from the Nigerian System Operator’s portal (niggrid.org), revealed that the grid recorded an unprecedented zero Megawatts (MW) as of 8:16 am today.

The data also revealed that all 22 generation companies (GenCos) are down as of the time of this report.

TCN describes grid collapse as a temporary disturbance

Reacting to the incident, TCN’s General Manager, Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah, explained that the bus section of a current transformer exploded at 330kV Jebba Transmission Substation, triggering the temporary shutdown.

“The Transmission Company of Nigeria hereby states that the national grid experienced a temporary disturbance at about 8:15 am, today, 19th Oct. 2024.

“According to the report from the NCC, the bus section of a current transformer exploded at 330kV Jebba Transmission Substation and as expected, the protection system was activated, and this promptly opened the busbars to curtail the explosion, thereby preventing the outbreak of fire and further damage to adjacent equipment.

“The action of the protection system led to a temporary disturbance on the grid.

“Our engineers at Jebba have successfully carried out switchings, isolating the faulty current transformer. They have equally reconfigured the busbar arrangement, restoring power supply to the station, and other parts of the grid,” Mbah said in a statement.

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