Oredola Adeola

The Federal Government has launched a framework to inject a total of 11.5 million prepaid meters over the next five years to ensure accurate billing, reducing revenue loss and improving cash flow for a more liquid power sector.

Chief Adebayo Adelabu, Minister of Power made this known in a remark on “Powering Nigeria’s Energy Future” during the BusinessDay Energy Conference held on Friday, in Lagos.

The Minister stated that the government has put in place the required framework to enable an injection of 1.5 million meters into the power sector through the World Bank Distribution Support Recovery Program.

He also assured that the Presidential Metering Initiative (PMI) will ensure an additional 2 million meters will be procured annually for 5 years.

According to him, this would ensure accurate billing, reducing revenue loss and improving cash flow for a more liquid power sector.

He further emphasised that Nigeria grappled with unreliable gas supply and quality, inadequate generation supply, an aging transmission network, inefficient distribution networks, and recently a need for a diversified energy mix to achieve the Nigeria Energy Transition Plan ambitions of 30% renewable energy mix from 30GW by 2030.

Adelabu noted that as part of efforts to address the Nigeria power sector infrastructure challenges, the government has embarked on several strategic initiatives designed to enhance sustainable energy development both in the short-term and long-term aimed at transforming our energy sector.

He confirmed the government’s effort to address the generation capacity to include the grid and the addition of the 700MW newly commissioned Zungeru hydropower plant.

He said, ” The Government has also secured Presidential approval to defray legacy debts to gas companies to allow efficient gas supply to the power sector going forward and a payment mechanism to address Generation Companies debts to ensure necessary maintenance is resolved and evacuation capacity optimization.

These, according to him, are efforts geared to not only increase our generation capacity but also improve the efficiency and reliability of our power supply.

Speaking on efforts of the government on the transmission network, Adelabu noted that the Presidential Power Initiative (PPI) is expanding the transmission grid to ensure it can handle the increased load from our new generation sources.

He said, “Simultaneously, we are supporting efforts targeted at modernizing our distribution networks to reduce losses and improve the quality of power delivered to consumers.

“In the last year, an additional 463MW transmission evacuation capacity has been added to the grid through this initiative.

“This was made possible through the signing of an accelerated performance agreement in Nov 2023 supervised by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz,” he said.

The Minister also revealed the plan by the FG to launch the World Bank’s $750 million Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-up (DARES) project, aimed at providing electricity to 2.5 million people through solar home systems and mini-grids across Nigeria.

This move, according to Adelabu, follows the successful $550 million Nigeria Electrification Plan, which recently delivered power to over 1.1 million households, MSMEs, and essential facilities in underserved rural areas.

The Power Minister emphasized that promoting renewable energy is both an environmental and economic necessity. With Nigeria’s abundant renewable resources, the government aims to diversify the energy mix, reduce carbon emissions, and ensure energy security.

He said, “The government is developing a National Electricity Policy and Strategic Implementation Plan, designed to enhance the policy and regulatory framework of the electricity sector.

“This initiative seeks to foster innovation, research, and sustainable development, creating a conducive environment for investment and fair competition in the energy sector,” Adelabu said.