Mr Ifeoluwa Oyedele, Executive Director, Networks, Niger Delta Power Holding Company of Nigeria (NDPHC), has advocated for a long time master plan for development of electricity sector in the country.
Oyedele stated this at an International Power Engineering Exhibition and Conference (IPECON), held in Abuja on Wednesday.
The conference, with the theme: “Nigerian Electricity Power Industry in Crises: Separating ‘Undue’ Politics from Power Market”, was organised by Nigerian Institute of Power Engineers (NIPE), in partnership with Nile University of Nigeria.
The power expert said that the master plan should be broken down to a five-year rolling plan, with practicable and realisable targets for each sector.
According to him, preparation for the master plan should be carried out, in consultation with policy makers and stakeholders in the industry, using international best practices.
“In doing this, we must avoid putting up jamboree and blame games.
”While we carry out the restructuring and preparation for the master plan, we must take practical steps to reduce Aggregate and Commercial Collection losses (ATC&C).
”We need to provide sufficient loops for improved system flexibility and reliability, and there is the need to install real time system operation tools, like Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) and Energy Management System (EMS) .
”We need to improve the reliability of the grid and reduce faults at the distribution ends. This should be carried out within a 12-month period and aligned with the master plan,” he said.
Oyedele, while speaking on privatisation of power sector, said that the process should be revisited without delay.
He said that non-performing actors might need to be supplemented or even removed, to bring in new players with verifiable financial and technical capacities to turn around the distribution end of the value chain.
”This will boost investor’s confidence in attracting the much-needed financing into the sector. We must ensure fairness through a clearly defined and impartial process,” he said.
Oyedele also stressed the need for regulations to be developed to deliver reliable power to the un-served and under-served communities in the urban and peri-urban areas.
According to him, these unplanned developments around each city in the country make up approximately 50 per cent of the urban population, now classified as category D consumers.
“Governments at all levels must take regional and urban planning seriously by enforcing regulations.
Earlier, President of NIPE, Mr Israel Abraham, said that the conference was specially designed to be proactive, proficient and involve solution peer-review sections where issues would be dissected and details of the meet-on projected brought to the fore.
Abraham said that the conference was a forum where specialists/technocrats interfaced with stakeholders and other professionals who shared deep passion for creating solutions to electricity industry.
“IPCON, as a conference, is unlike many others across the world, in that its outcomes are immediately taken up for implementation through rigorous advocacy interaction by NIPE with the relevant stakeholders to ensure success,” he said.
On his part, Chairman of Conference Planning Committee, Mr Stephen Ogaji, said that the technical sub-committee for the conference had carefully put together a theme and sub-theme for robust engagements.
Ogaji said that the engagements would dwell comprehensively on proffering viable solutions to the question posed by the conference theme.
“To enable mind-gapping from collaborative engagements and draw up viable solution, the technical sub-committees ensured that each of the seven plenary sections were followed by robust discussions on the questions raised by participants,” he said. (NAN)