An updated metering report in the power sector has said only 161,640 customers got meters between January and October 2016.
Most of the 11 electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) may not attain their annual target of installing 100,000 meters this year due to foreign exchange crisis among others with a month to the end of 2016, our reporter learnt.
However, another report from the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading (NBET) Plc revealed that the DisCos’ monthly energy payment dipped significantly with an average of 26.84 per cent payment for August.
Monthly metering statistics provided by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) at the 10th sectorial meeting in Akwa Ibom State showed that 3.329 million customers had meters by October.
The reported 161,640 meters installed so far, projects a huge shortfall of meter installation by year end.
Ibadan DisCo, which has the largest customers in its network, attained 50 per cent of its target by metering 50,730 customers between January and October 2016. It had promised installing 100,000 units annually.
Ikeja DisCo this year installed meters for 27,286 customers; Abuja DisCo installed 23,610 meters, Eko DisCo provided 21,131 meters; and Benin DisCo installed 20,244 meters.
While Port Harcourt DisCo installed 11,695 meters, the others had less than 4,000 installed meters this year.
Meanwhile, the NBET data published for August 2016 rated the DisCos’ payment performance below average on their remittances. The 11 DisCos consumed 91.69 per cent of the total energy (2.30 gigawatt hour-GWh) sent out in August but paid only 26.84 per cent of the bill. Rather than pay the N34.93 billion raised for them, they paid only N9.37 billion, the record showed.
The N28.32 billion market shortfall in August caused dropped payment to 24.61 per cent for the 20 Generation Companies’ (GenCos) bills. NBET said GenCos got only N9.37 billion instead of N38.09 billion for the month.
