Over 1,000 mini grids deployed to rural areas – REA

By

Faruk Shuaibu

The Managing Director of the Rural Electricity Agency (REA), Abba Abubakar Aliyu, has stated that more than 1,000 mini grids have been deployed across the country to provide electricity in rural areas.

Speaking during an appearance on Trust TV yesterday, Aliyu said the mini-grids are deployed through grants and finances by private investors to reduce the electricity deficit in the country.

He said the isolated mini-grids are targeting communities that are not connected to the grid while it is developing 50 interconnected mini-grids targeting communities that are underserved.

He stated that through the $750m Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-up (DARES), the government is catalysing private sector funding.

“The DARES is a World Bank finance project given to the Federal Government of Nigeria and the Federal Government of Nigeria gave it to the Rural Electrification Agency and we are mandated to use it to catalyse private sector funding. So, we are moving away from the traditional way of using borrowed money to give contracts.

“What we are doing is to use the $750m to incentivise the private sector to bring in $1.1bn to add to the $750m, giving you almost $2bn to now go and do this project. So, we are using it to provide capital grants to the private sector and we design result-based financing.”

He added that through interventions from President Bola Tinubu has led to the growth of PV manufacturing capacity from 120 megawatt to 500 to 600 MW.

“We have a pipeline of the 3.7 GW manufacturing capacity and as of today, made in Nigeria PV panels are produced in Lagos that are not only sold in Nigeria but also exported to other African countries. This is the transformation that is going on.”

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