By ABAH ADAH, Abuja
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has said it would look into the application submitted by the Aba Power Limited Electric (APLE) for extraordinary tariff review to ensure that it is fair and reflective of realities.
The Vice Chairman, Dr Musiliu Oseni, stated this in Abuja, during a Public Hearing organised by the Commission to review the application submitted by APLE for tariff adjustment.
“This hearing is part of our efforts to ensure that any tariff review is fair and reflects the realities on ground. We will carefully review the submissions made here today before making a final decision,” he said.
APLE is the electricity distribution company of Aba Integrated Power Project licensed by the NERC in 2007 to generate and distribute power from its 141MW power plant.
The company is asking NERC to allow it increase its electricity tariff from N122 per kilowatt hour (kWh) to N240 per kilowatt hour (kWh).
The company periodically procures electricity from the Niger Delta Power Holding Company’s (NDPHC) Alaoji Generation Company under a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) approved by NERC and sells to all customer classes in the Aba Ring Fence Area (ARFA) comprising nine out of the 17 Local Government Areas of Abia State.
Aba Power has been operating with a tariff approved by NERC in October 2022, hence the request for approval of a tariff to reflect the current macro-economic conditions that affect its operations.
Justifying the need for tariff adjustment in a presentation during the hearing, the Managing Director of Aba Power, Barr. Ugo Opiegbe, said the NDPHC has increased invoices for its wholesale energy cost to the APLE from the NERC approved PPA contract price of N21/kWh to N136.26/kWh.
According to him, even the cost of generation from Geometric Power Aba Limited (GPAL) is now N133.2/kWh, hence the need to incorporate the changes in the macroeconomic parameters and indices which affect the quality of service, operation and sustainability of the business.
He noted the utility company was acquired with about N26billion, but about N82billion in investment has been injected since taken over.
He said the company has “integrated its multi-billion naira distribution infrastructure in ARFA for improved service, and has successfully bifurcated and rehabilitated over 400km of 11kv lines.”
Speaking on metering, he said the company had about 158,000 customers, out of which about 58,000 customers had been metered, leaving the unmetered customers at a staggering number of 100,000.
He disclosed however that plans had been concluded by the company to deploy about 15,000 meters monthly in the coming year to close the metering gap.
The company proposed inflation rate of 25%; US inflation, 3.3%; exchange rate, N1654.4/$; Average Energy Offtake,135mwh; Aggregate Technical Commercial and Collection Losses, 21.26%; Annual Opex, N189.68912 billion; Annual Meter Capex, N4.17 billion; Annual Other Capex, N1.1486billion among others.