Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), says it has restored normal bulk transmission of electricity to its Apo transmission substation after a fire outbreak on one of its 45MVA 132/33kV power transformers on Sunday, which resulted from a direct fault from one of AEDC’s 33kV feeders which had a history of incessant trappings, noting that the 33kV lacked protection. The burnt 45MVA 132/33kv power transformer feeds electricity to Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC) 33kV feeders.
Ndidi Mbah, TCN’s General Manager Public Affairs in a statement on Monday said the fire was put off by the combined efforts of the Federal Capital Territory and the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation’s fire service. She, however, said it was still early for TCN to determine if the burnt transformer could be salvaged, adding that the Company was equally investigating possibility of transformer protection failure on its 45MVA power transformer.
Mbah said the Apo transmission substation had N-I redundancy and as such, power supply to all the areas that take supply from the substation through AEDC would not be affected by the incident.
“This is because the maximum load taken by AEDC from the burnt 45MVA transformer was 26MW, meanwhile maximum load AEDC takes from the old 100MVA in the substation is 56.5MW.
She said TCN was presently transmitting normal supply through the 2x100MVA 330/132kV and the second 45MVA 132/33kv power transformers in the substation.
She apologized on behalf of TCN for the inconveniences caused electricity consumers in the affected areas, noting that issue of protection of equipment must be taken very seriously. This, she said was to ensure that stability of the nation’s network was not compromised.