TCN Clears Air on Power Crisis, Says Grid Can Wheel 8,700MW

 

"The company's transmission wheeling capacity has risen to 8,700 megawatts (MW), while the highest electricity ever generated and delivered to the grid stands at 5,801.84MW." Engr. Sule Ahmed Abdulaziz, TCN's Managing Director/CEO 

..... Says "the figures show that transmission is not the primary bottleneck in Nigeria's electricity value chain."

The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) has pushed back against claims that the nation's transmission network is the major obstacle to improved electricity supply, insisting that the national grid currently has the capacity to transmit far more power than is being generated.

Speaking at the four-day Parliamentary/Stakeholders' Engagement Summit on Power Sector Reforms in Abuja, TCN Managing Director, Engr. Sule Ahmed Abdulaziz, said the company's transmission wheeling capacity has risen to 8,700 megawatts (MW), while the highest electricity ever generated and delivered to the grid stands at 5,801.84MW.

According to him, the figures show that transmission is not the primary bottleneck in Nigeria's electricity value chain.

Abdulaziz disclosed that TCN expanded its wheeling capacity from about 7,000MW to 8,700MW through strategic investments and infrastructure upgrades, while commissioning 82 transformers between January 2024 and November 2025, adding about 8,500MVA to the national grid.

He noted that the company also secured over $1.4 billion in financing from international development partners, including the World Bank, African Development Bank (AfDB), Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Agence Française de Développement (AFD), to support transmission expansion and modernization projects.

The TCN boss highlighted the historic grid performance recorded on March 4, 2025, when Nigeria achieved a peak transmission of 5,801.84MW and a record daily energy delivery of 128,370.75 megawatt-hours, describing the feat as evidence of growing network reliability.

Despite the gains, Abdulaziz identified vandalism of power infrastructure, right-of-way encroachment, inadequate funding, gas supply constraints, weak distribution networks and market liquidity challenges as major hurdles facing the electricity sector.

He called on the National Assembly to strengthen legal protection for critical power infrastructure, ensure adequate funding for transmission projects and support the full implementation of the Electricity Act 2023.

"Nigeria's electricity challenges are well understood, and the solutions are already known. What is required now is sustained political will, coordinated action and effective implementation," he said.

The TCN chief reaffirmed the company's commitment to expanding and modernising the national grid, stressing that reliable electricity can only be achieved through coordinated investments across generation, transmission and distribution segments of the power sector.