FG Issues 50 New Power Generation, Metering Licences

Electricity

FG Issues 50 New Power Generation, Metering Licences

The Federal Government in the last quarter of last year issued 50 new power generation and metering permits.

A report by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) stated that it approved the issuance of two new generation licences with a combined capacity of 56.50MW, and authorised the amendment of two on-grid embedded generation licences.

The commission also approved thirteen mini-grid permits, fourteen registration certificates for mini-grids with individual capacities below 1MW.

It also granted approval for the amendment/renewal of seven captive power generation permits with an aggregate capacity of 65.36MW.

On metering, NERC said applications from seven-meter installers, three-meter manufacturers and two-meter importers were also approved by the commission in Q4 2022.

Power generation and metering have continued to pose a huge challenge in the Nigerian power sector with generation stagnating below 5000MW for the past two years.

According to the report, the country’s 26 power generating plants produced a combined 4,497.32MW in the quarter under review, a far cry from an estimated 30,000MW experts say Nigeria would need to reach sufficiency.

The commission explained that inadequate meter deployment to end-users continued to be a “challenge” in the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry.

As of December 2022, only 5,134,871 of the 12,152,106 registered energy customers had been metered. A total of 164,612 meters were installed in Q4 2022.

The commission said it expects the electricity distribution companies to utilise any of the five-meter financing mechanisms that have been provided in the 2021 Meter Asset Provider and National Mass Metering Regulations to close their respective metering gaps.

As a safeguard for customers against exploitation due to the lack of meters, the commission said it continued to issue monthly energy caps for all feeders in each Disco which sets the maximum amount of energy that may be billed to an unmetered customer for the respective month based on gross energy received by the Disco and the consumption of metered customers.