Shell sponsored Afam VI power plant in Rivers State is ready to deliver its net dependable capacity of 624MW into the Nigerian national grid barring any regulator’s restrictions.
The cheering news comes at a time power generation has suffered a deep plunge following reported outage of some thermal power stations in the country.
Shell’s Managing Director and Country Chair of Shell Companies in Nigeria, Mr. Osagie Okunbor, told newsmen in Abuja on Tuesday that the Joint Venture project is ably maintained to consistently deliver its net dependable capacity of 624MW from an installed capacity of 650MW with its three gas turbines and one steam turbine.
He disclosed that in 2017 alone, Afam VI supplied approximately 14 per cent of Nigeria’s grid-connected electricity and that the plant has delivered over 25.97 trillion watt-hour of electricity into the Nigerian grid in the last 10 years.
Okunbor said. “What is most exciting is that the plant has achieved this milestone while also touching the lives of community people and helping youths to acquire key engineering skills.”
He said the operations at Afam VI have generated sub-contract opportunities and employment for over 150 people from the 16 host communities.
In addition, it also provided hands-on and offshore training for 30 youths in electrical, mechanical and instrumentation engineering on combined cycle power plant operations and maintenance. All the trainees are employable in the Nigerian power industry.
The country chair said the power plant also won the Best Company in Climate Action Award in the 2016 edition of Sustainability, Enterprise, Responsibility Awards for Corporate Social Responsibility (SERAs–CSR), an annual event to celebrate organisations that invest resources to improve the socio-economic living conditions of people in Nigeria and Africa.
Afam VI uses combined cycle gas turbine technology that burns 40 percent less gas than plants using older open cycle technologies. This also contributes significantly to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.
In November 2017, the Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission renewed SPDC JV’s Afam VI power generation licence for another 10 years, and in December 2017, the company signed an interim multi-year agreement with General Electric to improve the power plant’s availability, reliability and output for up to 200,000 Nigerian homes, while decreasing its operational costs.
The agreement covered planned maintenance for the four turbines and upgrading of the gas turbines to help increase the plant capacity by up to 30mw while increasing its efficiency and significantly saving fuel and reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
Located in Afam village in Oyigbo Local Government Area, the plant receives gas from SPDC JV’s gas plant at neighbouring Okoloma village.
