Regulatory Commission (NERC) has issued a license to the Bauchi State Government for the construction of 35MW gas-fired Independent Power Plant (IPP) through Yankari Power Company Limited.
Presenting the license to the state Governor, Isa Yuguda, in Abuja Wednesday, Chairman of NERC, Dr. Sam Amadi, said the state government had fulfilled all due process hence the issuance of the license for an embedded electricity generation.
Amadi expressed delight over the initiative, saying embedded generation is the future of electricity generation in the country, especially in the interim before the nation’s grid capacity improves.
According to the NERC boss, other states and companies are encouraged to embrace the embedded generation of electricity projects to provide sufficient and reliable electricity for their states.
“We are happy because embedded generation of electricity is the future of electricity in the country before our grid capacity improves to 40,000MW. This is a project we want other state governments and companies to emulate because it guarantees the improvement of the socio-economic activities of the state,” he said.
The Bauchi State governor, while receiving the licence expressed optimism for being the first state in the country to embark on such project, assuring that the 35MW of electricity would be delivered in three months.
Yuguda said the project is projected to gulp about $200 million, aims at generating about 1000MW in the next two to three years. He assured that already, a good financing arrangement had been worked out to draw from $1.6 billion soft loan obtained from China Exim Bank through the Federal Ministry of Finance to support the power sector.
He added that the state government is also looking for counterpart funding from the Bank of Industry (BoI) to ensure speedy completion of the project.
“I want to assure you that having obtained this license, in the next three months we will deliver the 35MW. I am happy to announce to you that the Federal Government has accommodated this project in $1.6 billion from China Exim Bank.”
He noted that many nations had followed the process to solve their electricity generation problems even as he urged other states to adopt the same method in the bid to provide electricity for the inhabitants of their states.
The Commissioner, Legal, Licensing and Enforcement, Stephen Azinge, noted that the state had complied with all due processes stipulated by the NERC for the application for licence hence the commission granted the company an embedded electricity generation licence.
