By Rosemary Caleb
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission has issued permits to MTN Communications Nigeria Limited,Golden Penny Power Limited Limited, Havenhill Synergy, and others for mini-grid electricity generation.
The NERC said it issued nine new off-grid generation licences in the first quarter of 2024 with a gross capacity of 109.69 megawatts and three new trading licences.
Report by the commission indicated that Golden Penny Power Limited got a licence to build six off-grid gas plants in Lagos, Oyo, Ogun, and Cross River states. The total capacity is 100MW.
Additionally ,MTN was granted a permit to build four captive generation plants across Lagos State with 15.94MW capacity.
Also,NERC gave permits to SweetCo Foods Limited, African Steel Mills Nigeria Limited, West African Ceramics Limited, Royal Engineered Stones Limited, and Armilo Plastics Limited to generate captive power.
It said “Captive power generation permits are issued to entities that aim to own and maintain power plants for generating power for consumption and not for sale to a third party. The commission issued nine captive power generation permits in 2024/Q1 with a total nameplate capacity of 52.57MW.
Current matters gathered that other licensed companies for mini-grids are Daybreak Power Solutions, TIS Renewable Energy Limited, Auro Nigeria Private Limited, Watts Exchange Limited, Centum Dopemu Energy Services Ltd, DMD Electric Limited Lagos State.
The Commission’s decision is in line with “Section 165(1)(m) of the Electricity ACT 2023 which permits the commission to award licence of mini-grid concessions to renewable energy companies to exclusively serve a specific geographical location indicating aggregate electricity to be generated and distributed from a site with the obligation to serve customers to request service”
Under the development, the commission said it issues registration certificates to a mini-grid developer for one or more systems with distribution capacity below 100kW.
“Following the satisfactory evaluation of mini-grid applications, the commission issued three mini-grid permits and two registration certificates in 2024/Q1,”
Within the period , NERC stated that it certified six Meter Service Providers, including four meter installers and two meter manufacturers.
The certified meter service providers are Genobet Limited (installer), Mojec Meter Asset Management (installer), Epagad International Services Limited (installer), Abdulrahman Ahmadu Zubairu (installer), Smart Meters Company Limited (manufacturer), and Crestflow Energy Limited (manufacturer).
NERC also said it issued one regulation and 36 new Orders in 2024/Q1. They include NERC–R–001–2024 — Eligible Customer Regulations, 2024; NERC/2023/023—NERC/2023/033 — Multi-Year Tariff Order 2024 for the Distribution Companies; and NERC/2023/034 — MYTO 2024 for the Transmission Company of Nigeria Plc.
Others are NERC/2023/035 — Order on Performance Improvement Plan of the Transmission Company of Nigeria; NERC/2024/001 — Order on the Regulatory Intervention in Kaduna Electricity Distribution Plc; NERC/2024/004 – NERC/2024/014 — Order on Noncompliance with Capping of Estimated Bill by DisCos for the period January – September 2023; and NERC/2024/016 – NERC/2024/036 — February 2024 Supplementary Order to the Multi-Year Tariff Order for the Discos.
It was also revealed that during the quarter, the commission issued 36 orders to guide the activities of licensees.
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