TheCable

The association of power generation companies (APGC) says members are owed N1.75 trillion for power generated for the electricity market since 2013.

Joy Ogaji, executive secretary, APGC, made this known on Thursday during a panel session at the association of energy correspondents of Nigeria (NAEC) strategic international conference in Lagos.

The session was titled ‘power sector dilemma: issues, challenges, opportunities, and strategic key solutions’. 

Ogaji said the liquidity challenge of the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry (NESI) had made operating in the generation value-chain very difficult for the companies.

She added that GenCos were currently owing their gas suppliers about N1 trillion and also servicing loans used for the acquisition of the companies in 2013.

Ogaji said the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Company (NBET) needs to intensify efforts to ensure remittances by the 11 electricity distribution companies (DisCos) for energy consumed by their customers.

The executive secretary said GenCos were ready to generate the power needed in Nigeria, but utilisation had stagnated in the country for a long time due to transmission and distribution constraints.

“Just to give you a context, on November 1, 2013, when the privatisation took place, power was 3,427mw on the day of take-over. On December 1, 2013, power had gone from 3,427MW to over 4,003mw and by 2020 it had gone up to nearly 8,000mw,” she said.

Ogaji, however, said the average uptake of power from the GenCos was about 4,000mw hour (MWh) from 2013 to date, “which is not good for business”.

“So, this does not encourage any investor to keep investing because clearly, it shows that your product is not needed,” Ogaji added.

“Notwithstanding how Nigerians are always saying give us power, but generation production is driven by demand.

“When demand is not  moving in line with the production, the producer is not incentivised to produce and this is a major problem.” 

Ogaji also decried lack of access to foreign exchange (FX) by GenCos which had posed a major challenge to their operations in recent times.