Vandalism Worsens Grid Collapse as Gas Shortage Slashes Power Supply

Nigeria witnessed its sixth power grid collapse of 2024 on Monday, as electricity generation on the system collapsed from 2,583.77 megawatts at 2 am to 64.7MW around 3am before the grid was restored later in the day.

Although the Transmission Company of Nigeria attributed the cause of Monday’s grid collapse to a fire incident, it had consistently blamed gas shortage for power generation and the vandalism of power infrastructure for the recurrent cases of grid collapse in Nigeria.

Nigeria generates an average of 4,000MW of electricity for an estimated 200 million citizens across the country.

But this is hardly sustainable, as the grid continues to record incessant collapse due to gas supply constraints, transmission infrastructure vandalism, and liquidity crisis, among others.

Data from the Independent System Operator, an arm of the Transmission Company of Nigeria, showed that only one electricity generation company, Ibom Power, was active at the time of the grid collapse on Monday morning.

Power generation on the grid crashed further to 44.5MW around 4 am, before rising to 132.29MW an hour later.