The Federal Government has commissioned upgraded transmission facilities at four major substations in Lagos, adding about 360 megawatts (MW) to the state’s transmission capacity.
The projects, located at Ijora, Apapa Road, Alausa and Lekki substations, are expected to strengthen bulk power delivery to residential, commercial and industrial consumers within the networks of Eko and Ikeja Electricity Distribution Companies.
Speaking at the commissioning, Minister of Power, Joseph Tegbe, said the investments were aimed at removing transmission bottlenecks and improving electricity supply and reliability across Lagos.
“These infrastructures have been here for over 25 years. What we are doing is commissioning new power transformers in Apapa, Ijora, Alausa and Lekki transmission substations. This is important as it will increase our wheeling capacity and also improve our delivery to end-users,” Tegbe said.
At the Ijora substation, two new 100MVA transformers increased installed capacity from 90MVA to 230MVA, adding about 112MW.
The Apapa Road substation received two 60MVA transformers and modern gas-insulated switchgear, raising its capacity from 60MVA to 180MVA and adding about 96MW.
At Alausa, an existing 30MVA transformer was replaced with a 100MVA unit, increasing total capacity from 135MVA to 205MVA and adding about 56MW. The additional capacity has also increased power allocation to Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company to 80MW.
The Lekki substation received two 60MVA transformers, one 300MVA transformer and nine additional 33kV feeders. The intervention doubled transformation capacity at the 132/33kV level from 120MVA to 240MVA.
Tegbe said the Alausa project alone could provide electricity to about 70,000 households, representing approximately 180,000 people, while the Lekki intervention is expected to benefit about 100,000 customers, or an estimated 400,000 people.
The Managing Director of the Transmission Company of Nigeria, Sule Ahmed Abdulaziz, said the projects were supported by the World Bank and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), with Shanghai Electric involved in their execution.
The Federal Government said the upgraded facilities would improve the capacity of the transmission network to deliver bulk electricity to distribution companies and, ultimately, consumers across Lagos.