Hope rekindled for steady electricity as REA-NEP partners Stanbic IBTC on power supply
Features.
By Cyril Mbah, Abuja.
Electricity is a vital commodity of modern life which drives businesses, industrialisation and the citizens' social life especially in the night.
People are increasingly becoming dependent on electric energy for many activities that rely on energy sources to function and electricity has assumed a prominent role as the life-wire of cities and villages in many advanced economies.
Regrettably, this vital commodity is annoyingly in constant short-supply in Nigeria despite the humongous amounts of money spent on the development of the power sector due to many endemic factors. Its scarcity and the lingering short-supply, which sometimes hinges on sabotage, has negatively affected everything including development processes and has slowed down the nation's economic growth as people in urban and rural areas grapple with high cost of providing energy for themselves.
In urban cities, energy supply has become so colossally unreliable and many communities are still complaining that there are hardly steady power supply for up to six hours any day even as villagers in several local government areas live in darkness and the constant hope that the government will someday connect them to the national grid to experience the transformation associated with electricity because their communities have not been supplied electricity.
Some of the negative effects of the absence or poor power supply include unmitigated rural to urban mass migration, avoidable environmental pollution resulting from excessive use of power generating sets by companies and individuals and low productivity by businesses that depend on electricity to stay afloat as each enterprise spends so much on power generation.
Hopefully, the bottlenecks delaying the electrification of rural communities and the provision of steady electricity in the country will soon be overcome with the recent partnership agreement signed by the Rural Electrification Agency and the Stanbic IBTC to provide electric energy to rural communities across the country.
The partnership agreement initiated by the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) and the Stanbic IBTC will enable the two outfits to collaborate on generation and distribution of renewable clean energy. The initiative has given Nigerians renewed hope that steady power supply may be around the corner for rural communities and the grossly under-supplied urban areas by extension.
A new firm known as the Nigeria Electrification Project (NEP), was setup by the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) at the instance of the Federal Government to drive the initiative with World Bank and the African Development Bank financing and it plans to increase access to electricity for households, micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in off-grid communities across Nigeria through renewable energy processes.
In order to actualise the plan, the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) after intense negotiations, backed the Nigeria Electrification Project (NEP) to form the strategic collaboration with Stanbic IBTC, a member of Standard Bank Group to promote the development and deployment of clean energy across Nigeria.
The collaboration initiative was conceived to make power accessible to rural communities and provide alternative energy to businesses and firms, as part of a broader strategy to support stakeholders in the energy value chain.
At a meeting where the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed, a representative of Stanbic IBTC, identified as Mr. Patrick expressed gratitude that the bank was chosen for the partnership and he listed the benefits and importance of stakeholder engagement on the project.
Patrick emphasized that the success of the initiative requires the support of agencies, customers and all stakeholders involved in the energy value chain. "We need all the support from the agency. We are here to support the agencies as well and also the customers and everyone in the value chain."
The Head of the Nigeria Electrification Project, Alhaji Abba Aliyu, while responding, expressed appreciation over Stanbic IBTC’s acceptance of the challenge and its commitment to the cause of implementing the project even as he underscored the vast opportunities in the off-grid sector.
Aliyu disclosed that part of the achievements of NEP, included the deployment of over 100 mini-grids and about 1.5 million solar systems to power several homes across Nigeria.
He expressed the hope in the new, more ambitious energy project on which a commitment of $950 million, obtained from development partners, has been made and also disclosed plans to pilot a framework to design financial solutions for developers of solar systems to accelerate the deployment of clean energy projects.
Alhaji Aliyu decried the challenges faced by developers in accessing necessary capital for research and development and he expressed optimism that collaboration with financial service providers like Stanbic IBTC would lead to innovative solutions in the energy sector.
He decried the difficulties experienced in the past on funding and highlighted efforts being made to secure payments to developers in dollars to mitigate associated risks and encourage financial institutions to harness the opportunities presented by the project.
The Stanbic IBTC representative reassured NEP of the bank's commitment to the initiative, emphasizing the importance of sustainability and the positive impact of clean energy on communities and the economy.
"The crumbling of (the project) is not even an issue for us. As a group, we have sustainability as a top priority. We are looking at what (opportunities) the energy enables. Sustainability of communities, ability to now drive economic activities within those communities and the upliftment of the social structures of the communities," he said.
The representative reiterated that Stanbic IBTC and NEP are committed to working together to support the development and deployment of clean energy solutions to help contribute to the betterment of Nigerian communities and the economy.
Reports about the agreement will no doubt generate frenzied reactions of excitement in many communities where the people have continued to hope that affordable electricity will not only become a reality when the project is completed but that power supply will become a constant, everyday experience because the project will enable benefiting communities bypass dependence on the mainstream power supply channels.
The initiative is a welcome development and should be recommended to other government agencies still dragging their feet about adopting necessary innovations especially some of them that have not considered the advantages of looking outside the box to solve the many problems facing the nation. Ends.