Nigeria’s National Electricity Grid has collapsed again for the third successive time. The situation has plunged the West African giant into total darkness which is partly affecting businesses and industries.
The latest collapse, the third in less than a month, came despite assurances by the Federal Government of taken steps to deal with the situation head on.
However, the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) which manages the grid had last month stated that, it had developed an alternative ways of managing the grid.
A statement by TCN sighted by energynewsafrica.com, said, its “in-house engineers have deployed a stop-gap solution to improve grid monitoring and acquisition of data from remote stations (power stations and transmission substations) to the National Control Centre. This, according to them was achieved by utilizing the Internet of Things (IoT) solution and Virtual Private Network (VPN) by using various Internet Service Providers (ISP).
“This temporary use of the Network Automation System was deployed to assist TCN in conveying critical operational measurements data from remote stations to NCC using Web Technology, which is an integral component of the IoT. So far, the data received from remote stations has enabled NCC to obtain more insight into the situation of the power flow on the grid and has enabled NCC to make decisions that have impacted positively on the security and integrity of the Grid.
“The stop-gap solution became necessary as TCN could not access and receive comprehensive operational data of the entire power grid for managing the fast-growing system. The existing inadequate SCADA System cannot provide adequate grid visibility, as parts of the existing SCADA system are moribund and damaged, coupled with an ineffective telecommunication network infrastructure.’’
In a public notice sent to customers by Eko Electricity Distribution Company sighted by energynewsafrica.com, it said: “We regret to inform you that the current outage affecting our entire network is due to system. TCN team is working to resolve it as soon as possible. Sincere apologies for the inconvenience caused. Please bear with us.’’
Many Nigerians have however, resorted to social media to register their displeasure about the seeming unending power crisis in the country.
Source: https://energynewsafrica.com
