The management of Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, has disclosed that it is embarking on a swot up that would assist it in laying underground cables to connect Eko Atlantic with a view to supplying electricity to the modern city.
TCN’s Managing Director, Mr. Usman Gur Mohammed, who disclosed this in Abuja, noted that Eko Atlantic, which is a new coastal city being built on Victoria Island, Lagos, needed urgent electricity connectivity.
Eko Atlantic is standing on 10 million square metres of land reclaimed from the ocean and protected by a 9.5 kilometre long sea wall.
Mohammed said further that the management of the Eko Atlantic has approached the TCN to connect them with electricity, noting that the company was making frantic efforts to pass underground cable from Alagbon to Eko Atlantic.
According to him: “The other project we are doing is the Eko Atlantic City, I took a photograph of Eko Atlantic the last time I visited and posted to some of my friends on Facebook and I asked them which place is this? Most people said it is Dubai, some people said it is America and some people said it is other places.
“I am telling you it is in Lagos. That Eko Atlantic is almost twice the size of Victoria Island. That place is fantastic and one of the biggest private investments in the world, I think so for now. You need to go to the place. But the biggest challenge of that place is power supply. Because there are houses that are in that place but unfortunately, they are generating their own electricity.
“Now, the management of Eko Atlantic has approached the TCN that they want us to connect them through Alagbon, and we have agreed to do it. We have completed the technical review. ”
He disclosed: “We actually initially wanted to merge them with 33kv. But we felt that it will delay it and so we removed them. And we are going to do it alone.
“Now, that study will help us to establish how we are going to pass underground cable from Alagbon to Eko Atlantic. And we are looking at the possibility of installing two additional 123 KV in Lagos, one on Lagos Island and another one in Victoria Island to serve this purpose.”
Meanwhile, the TCN has completed a 30/40MVA 132/33kV transmission substation project in Wudil, Kano State and a brand new 60MVA 132/33kV power transformer in Akure, Ondo State.
The transformer and substation project, according to the statement issued by TCN’s General Manager, Public Affairs, Mrs. Ndidi Mbah, would be officially commissioned by Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Raji Fashola on yet to be announced date.
She, however, said the transformers have been energised and are supplying the communities where they are located and their environs.
Mrs Mba stated that the projects are an addition to the 27 power transformers completed across the country mainly by TCN in-house engineers.
She explained that the contract for construction of Wudil 30/40MVA 330/33kV Transmission Substation was awarded in 2009 but the contractor failed persistently to complete the contract for nine years.
“Consequently, TCN took over the project within the 1st week of July, 2018, in line with its Transmission Rehabilitation and Expansion Programme aimed at strengthening the grid for improved power supply.
