Why Nigerians suffered power outage

The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) on Tuesday said arcing on the Benin-Egbin 330kV isolator caused lines tripping and consequent loss of electricity supply to some areas on Monday.

The TCN General Manager, Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah, disclosed this in a statement Tuesday.

“The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), hereby notes that at about 6:10 p.m. yesterday, 5th August 2024, power supply was restored to areas that had been affected by the arcing on the Benin-Egbin 330kV isolator which caused lines tripping and consequent loss of supply to some areas,” Ms Mbah said.

Arcing is a type of electrical discharge that occurs when electrons flow between two conductors, usually metal, in an environment with a gas or vacuum.

Earlier on Monday, the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC), in a statement posted on its X handle said the national grid collapsed around 2:55 p.m. on Monday, with generation dropping significantly.

On Tuesday, TCN, in a statement, said contrary to media reports, the incident did not cause a system collapse.

“The line tripping started earlier at about 2:47 p.m. yesterday, with a heavy system surge that led to the arcing of Benin – Egbin 330kV line isolator fingers at the Egbin transmission substation switchyard,” Ms Mbah said.

This, she said, resulted in a tripping at the Egbin generating station, which caused the loss of power supply to all the Egbin transmission substations’ outgoing lines.

She explained that this led to an exponential increase in load on the Osogbo-Ihovbor 330kV line 1 with serious arcing of isolator terminals on the Osogbo-Ihovbor 330kV line 1.

“To ensure that the sequence of events does not affect the nation’s grid, the Osogbo – Ihovbor 330kV line was opened to temporarily cut off the flow of electricity on that line.

“At about 2:56 p.m., however, the Benin-Egbin 330kV line 1 Circuit Breaker also tripped at the Benin transmission substation end and this resulted in the loss of supply to Lagos axis, parts of the South West region, parts of the North Central and Abuja,” she added.

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Meanwhile, she said other areas, including the South Eastern region, North East, and other parts of North Central and South West, had full power supply.

“The line tripping was quickly rectified, enabling the grid controller to restore full bulk power supply through the transmission lines at about 6.10 p.m. yesterday,” she said.