Brief History

As part of the evolution in the Power Industry in Nigeria, the Federal Government by Decree No. 24 of 1972 created the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA). This was consequent upon the merger of the Electricity Corporation of Nigeria (ECN) and Niger Dams Authority (NDA). In September 1990, the partial commercialization came into being with the appointment of a Managing Director/Chief Executive to superintend over the Corporation. Also, the Authority was divided into four autonomous divisions namely: Generation and Transmission; Distribution and Sales; Engineering; Finance and Administration. Each division was headed by an Executive Director.

The Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) took further steps towards the Restructuring of the Nigerian Power Sector to establish an electricity supply that is efficient, reliable and cost-effective throughout the country and which will attract private investment. Subsequently, another Power Sector Reform Act was enacted in 2005, transferring the public monopoly of NEPA to Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) which was unbundled into 18 Business Units (BU); viz eleven (11) Distribution companies:- six (6) Generation companies and one (1) Transmission company .

The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) is one of the successors of the unbundled PHCN and is currently an asset held under the custodianship of the Federal Ministry of Power. It will initially remain publicly owned. TCN has the responsibility for the management of operation, maintenance and expansion of the 132kV and 330kV transmission system. The Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE) recently appointed a Management Contractor, Manitoba Hydro International (MHI) for TCN which took over the functions of Transmission Service Provider, System Operator and Market Operator to undertake the overall management of TCN.

System Operations (SO) function was established as a sector within the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria under t he Transmission sector. The SO has now evolved into a semi-autonomous sector under TCN and upon acquiring its license would operate as an independent company in future. The main responsibility of the System Operator is to operate the transmission system and the connected installed generation in a safe and reliable manner. SO is also responsible for the overall security and reliability of the grid system, economic dispatch of available generation resources and maintaining system stability. SO has seven functional departments namely; Operations/Control, System Planning, SCADA, Communications, Technical Services, Transitional Electricity Market and System Performance. SO is headed by the Executive Director (System Operation). The operational control hierarchy is as follows:

  • National Control Centre (NCC), Osogbo
  • Three (3) Regional Control Centres (RCCs) at Shiroro, Ikeja West and Benin. With proposed control centres at Kano, Alaoji and Gombe
  • Eight (8) Regional Operations Cordinating units (ROCs) at Benin, Enugu, Port-Harcourt, Bauchi, Kaduna, Shiroro, Osogbo and Lagos – several Area Control Centres covering 330kV and 132kV substations which fall under the supervision of the ROCs.

Mission Statement: Exercising grid control to maintain an efficient, coordinated and economic supply of electricity in accordance with the grid code and operational procedures

Vision: Operate the grid system efficiently to ensure open access, safe, reliable and economic electricity supply

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