As the parlous state of power supply across the country worsened in the last few days, the Power Holding Company of Nigeria announced on Thursday that it will from Friday, (today) begin zonal power rationing.
In a statement Thursday night, the utility company said the rationing will be done nationwide on a 12-hourly basis.
According to the statement, �There will be a nationwide 12-hourly zonal power rotational rationing from 6am � 6pm and 6pm � 6am starting from Friday, July 4, 2008.�
The statement, which was credited to the management of the company claimed that the exercise was to ensure even distribution of the limited generation out-put from functioning plants.
It also confirmed the report by the PUNCH on Thursday that there was a serious power crisis, which the officials had refused to come clean about until the report.
The management of the company further stated that the issue of inadequate gas supply to the thermal power stations Egbin, Omotosho, Geregu, Delta and Sapele was yet to be resolved.
The statement read, �Low water levels at the lakes of the hydro power stations, which account for 25 per cent of the nation�s generation out-put has compounded the instability in the power system leading to the prevailing nationwide load shedding.
�The low level was brought about by the increased draw down of water during dry season to augment shortfall in the thermal units.�
Although PHCN claimed that it was working hard to ensure improvement in power supply, the statement was silent on when this should be expected or the current generation capacity, which is believed to be embarrassing.
Our correspondent had gathered exclusively on Wednesday that generation had below 900 mega watts for the whole country on Tuesday.
At peak performance, the PHCN generates about 3,000MW which is hardly sufficient, leading to constant power outages.
Our correspondent gathered that AES, the privately owned thermal power company located in Lagos was undergoing turnaround maintenance, hence its output of about 300MW was out.
Observers are baffled that the hydro stations are yet to reach their peak performance despite the steady rains since April.