Electricity consumers in Nigeria paid N258.9bn in 7 months

Story from Abah ADAH, Abuja

Electricity consumers in Nigeria paid N258.91 billion for electricity in the first seven months of 2022, the latest report from the Nigeria Bulk Electricity Trading Plc (NBET), has revealed.

The report, however, indicated that the amount was N194.4 billion short of the N453.31 billion invoiced for electricity supplied over the period. The figure was also 24.91 percent short of the Minimum Remittance Order (MRO), set by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), for electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos).

A further look at the monthly remittances by the DisCos showed that 11 firms remitted N38.87 billion in January, N40.08 billion in February, N31.27 billion in March, and N38.78 billion in April. N30.09 billion in May, N33.48 billion in June, and N46.34 billion in July.

NERC had on July 1, activated a partial Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Generation Companies (GenCos) for the supply of 5,505 megawatts of electricity for peak generation and a base load of 4,893MW. The move is part of efforts by the government to improve the electricity supply.

The agreement guarantees payment for gas supplied to the GenCos by gas companies and also ensures that the generation companies are paid for power supplied to the national grid.

The new partial PPA means that all the 25 power generation plants on the grid now have an agreement in place to generate a certain amount of power and get paid for it.

Checks on power generation data released by the National System Operator (NSO), a unit in the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), showed that the grid hit a peak generation of 4,718.8MW on Saturday, according to Guardian.

Eight DisCos with the exception of Eko, Ikeja, and Yola have not met the requirements of the MRO.

NBET stands as the wholesaler of power purchased from GenCos to DisCos through the Vesting Contract. Under the DisCo-NBET Vesting Contracts, each DisCo, as a buyer, is contracted to receive a certain percentage of energy from NBET, which in turn, will receive energy from each GenCo under the PPAs.

DisCos are mandated to collect, on whole, revenue based on the approved tariff which is a percentage of the actual cost-reflective tariff.

Meanwhile, the approved tariff determines the percentage of the total invoice figure to be paid by the DisCos and this is referred to as the Minimum Remittance (MR), usually published as Minimum Remittance Order (MRO) by NERC.

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