by Nurat Uthman
The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) has reacted to reports of the breakdown of the national grid on Saturday, describing it as a ‘temporary grid disturbance’.
The reaction comes after the grid broke down for the third time this week.
The grid collapse occurred early Saturday morning, with many states reporting total blackouts.
Data obtained 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.
Data showed that all 22 generation companies (GenCos) are down as of the time of this report.
The grid had collapsed twice this week, marking the eighth grid disturbance in 2024.
Reacting to the collapse, TCN’s General Manager, Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah said although the bus section of a current transformer had exploded at 330kV Jebba Transmission Substation, power has been restored.
“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 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,” the statement read.
