Power supply to improve as Abuja gets N68 billion plants

Description:

Troubles over electricity supply in the Federal Capital Territory would soon be a thing of the past as Abuja Investments Company Limited (AICL) and the Abuja Environmental Protection Board (AEPB) yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Karkara Rapid Development Limited for the provision of four energy plants for Abuja, estimated at about N68 billion.

The power plants, according to the Chairman of Karkara Rapid Development Limited, Amb. M.S Umoru, would be completed by October 2010 and would generate an initial 30 megawatts each, which would continue to rise.

He stated that the company, which is working with an American-based company, Global Waste Conversion Company, based in Washington DC, had also executed similar projects in United Arab Emirates and Malaysia, and is presently working with the US army to convert carbon energy to green energy.

He disclosed that the project would be executed with an interest-free loan, and that work on the project would begin as soon as due diligence work would be completed in 16 weeks, and would be commissioned in a minimum of nine months.

"The four plants have 30 megawatts each and as Abuja is increasing in population, the waste would be increasing and a generator would be added to take it to 60 megawatts. As waste is increasing, we will add another generator to take it to 90 megawatts for each plant, totaling 360 megawatts at the end of the day. This kind of arrangement was not available for Lagos; that's why it is in a mess today, and the wonderful thing to realize is that there would be fertilizer for agriculture. We also have a plant that uses used tyres, to get non-flammable aviation fuel.

This project is going to benefit the FCT economically and it would no longer depend on federation account for funds. It is a very serious project and we have the technology to pull it through" he said.

Managing Director of AICL, Mr Abdu Mukhtar, remarked that the signing of the MoU had come at a good time when the FCT Minister, Senator Adamu Aliero, had mandated the company, together with the AEPB, to work out modalities for the establishment of waste management plants, to find lasting solutions to the problem of waste management in the territory. He said that four power plants would be built around the present AEPB waste dump so that the waste generated in the city would be converted and used for energy generation which would serve the FCT and environs.

"In addition to energy, we would be able to produce fertilizer and other bye products" he said.

Director of AEPB, Dr Abubakar Shehu Yabo, described waste management as the major challenge to the board with the high influx of people into the FCT, adding that the project would not have come at a better time.

He said: "We have received several proposals for this kind of project but each we receive has one problem or the other and after holding series of meetings with clear explanations on the workings of this project, we realized that this is the most viable of them all, which informed our decision to settle for it."