Shiroro Power to construct 3,000mw solar power plant

The management of Shi­roro Hydroelectric Power Station has concluded plans to construct a 300mega­watts, mw photo voltaic solar power plant in order to assist in increasing the nation’s capacity.

The project is to be located on the existing plant premises which were concessioned to the North- South Power Company, NSP Limited on November 1, 2013, the firm’s Chief Technical Officer, Mr. Roland Lwiindi, has disclosed.

Lwiindi gave the hint when the Post Privatisation Monitor­ing Team of the Bureau of Pub­lic Enterprises, BPE, recently went to monitor the power sta­tion in Shiroro, Niger State.

He said the project would start as soon as approval was obtained from the relevant authorities, with its first phase coming on stream in 2017.

According to him, when com­pleted the plant would add 300 megawatts of electricity to the existing 600 megawatts.

Lwiindi remarked that the ca­pacity of hydro powered plant usually declines during dry sea­sons but that the proposed Photo Voltic Solar Facility would shore up its power generation during the off peak seasons.

He said the plant would rely on the sun to make up for the short fall in power generation.

He explained that the man­agement of the power plant has the requisite expertise to realise the envisaged gains of privatiza­tion and also assured that with the infrastructural upgrade and technical expertise at the dis­posal of the company, the coun­try would continue to witness improved power supply.

The Chief Operations Officer of the plant, Abdul-Aziz Daudu remarked the BPE monitors that since takeover by the new investors, the generators and three out of the four turbines had been overhauled to boost power output from the power plant. He said plans were on to overhaul the fourth turbine.

He also said that work was in progress to upgrade the Excita­tion Systems, ES from analogue to digital and that a new Pro­grammable Logic Controller, PLC has been installed for im­proved power generation in line with the concession agreement.

The leader of the BPE moni­toring team, Mr. Abdullahi Sh­uaibu, commended the manage­ment for the strides achieved since take over and noted that it was an attestation to the gains of privatisation.

He stressed the strategic posi­tion of the Shiroro Power plant in the country’s power sector and said that it was for that reason that the Federal govern­ment decided to concession the plant instead of outright sale.

“The concession approach is to prevent monopoly within the sector as this approach would leave the doors open for more players from the private sector’, he added.