President Bola Tinubu  on Friday performed the ground breaking ceremony for the  Gwagwalada Independent Power Plant, GIPP, which on completion will generate an average of 10.3 million Megawatts hour (MWh) of electricity per year for sale to the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc (NBET).


The Nigerian National Petroleum Company described the GIPP) project as a giant step towards achieving its gas and power mandate to add five gigawatts into the national power generation by 2024.


Malam Mele Kyari, Group CEO, NNPC Ltd., made this known during  the presidential groundbreaking of the 350 Megawatts, NW GIPP project.


The gas plant is a 1,350MW Combined Cycle Power Plant with auxiliaries and Balance of Plant to be situated on 547 hectares of land already acquired at Gwagwalada, Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.


The GIPP was necessitated by the need for delivering gas toward additional power generation capacity in Nigeria.
The gas supply to the plant shall be through the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) Gas Pipeline which is currently at its advanced stage of construction.


Kyari said the 350MW project was the first phase of the planned capacity of 1,350MW Gwagwalada Independent Power Plant.


According to him, Nigeria is endowed with significant natural gas resources of over 209TCF of proven gas reserves, and potential reserve of over 600TCF.


He said as a commercial enterprise, NNPC took the project as an opportunity to monetise Nigeria’s abundant natural gas resources, by expanding access to energy to support economic growth, industrialisation, and job creation nationwide.


To achieve this national aspiration, he said, the NNPC had invested heavily in domestic gas footprint expansion projects through the delivery of the Trans-Nigeria Pipeline Project.


This, he said, included the Escravos to Lagos Pipeline System (ELPS & ELPS Il), the Obiafu-Obrikom-Oben (0B3) gas pipeline and the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) gas pipeline.


“Currently NNPC and partners are delivering about 800MW to the national grid from Afam VI and Okpai Phase One thermal power plants with combined installed capacity of 1,100MW.


“We have also completed Okpai Phase Two project that will add up to 320MW of power to the national grid and progressing with other power plant projects across the country including those along the AKK pipeline route.


“The Gwagwalada IPP is among the NNPC flagship power projects along the AKK corridor. This is part of the 3,600MW cumulative power capacity which includes Kaduna IPP (900MW) and Kano IPP (1,350MW),” he said.


He said the project would be delivered in collaboration with General Electric as the Original Equipment Manufacturer and China Machinery and Engineering Corporation as the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) Contractor.


He said just as NNPC had recently inaugurated the 50MW Maiduguri Emergency Power plant, it would continue to replicate similar viable business opportunities across the Nation to ensure energy affordability.


He, however, acknowledged the support of stakeholders including the Ministry of Power, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc , Transmission Company of Nigeria, Abuja Electricity Distribution Company and Gwagwalada host community.


He assured that expanding access to energy would change the game, create a better investment climate and promote balanced economic growth, a win-win situation for the nation and for NNPC as a commercial energy company.


Kyari also acknowledged the progressive policy direction of Tinubu’s led administration to renew hope and reposition the Nigerian economy.


“The esteemed presence of Your Excellency at this event is a demonstration of your commitment and support to improve the nation’s power generation capacity to spur economic growth for our country, and for this, we are indeed grateful,” he said.




NAN