Nigeria says to build $ 6 bln nuclear power plants

By Staff
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ABUJA, Feb 7 (Reuters) Nigeria's outgoing government has approved plans to build nuclear power plants worth 6 billion dollars over the next 10-15 years to resolve the nation's severe electricity shortage, a minister said today.

Science and Technology Minister Turner Isoun said the project would be funded by the private sector, but he did not offer any details on how this might work.

''A decision was taken by the council today to bring in the elements of nuclear power plants,'' Isoun told reporters after a cabinet meeting in Abuja. This government is due to hand over power after elections in April.

''If we are to be an emerging industrialised nation we should be generating about 30,000 to 40,000 megawatts (MW). We have no choice to achieve this but to factor in the elements of nuclear power plants,'' said Isoun.

Nigeria's installed power generation capacity is about 6,000 MW but it has been producing half of that or less for years due to inefficiency, technical faults and militant attacks on a major gas pipeline supplying power stations.

Nigeria is Africa's top oil exporter but corruption by successive governments and mismanagement at the state power utility have led to massive shortfalls in power supply.

Investors cite constant blackouts as one of the country's top economic hurdles. Companies spend millions of dollars every year on diesel-fuelled generators to keep facilities running.

Many of Nigeria's 140 million people have no access to electricity and for those who do, power cuts lasting hours or even days are a fact of life.

The old National Electric Power Authority (NEPA), popularly known as Never Expect Power Always, has been dissolved ahead of privatisation and replaced by the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), nicknamed Problem Has Changed Name.

ROAD MAP Isoun said Nigeria had a road map towards nuclear power generation. The first stage was the training of 2,000 scientists, engineers, technicians and draughtsmen, he said, offering no details on how this would be achieved.

He also said the project would be developed with foreign partners, but gave no details.

Isoun had in 2005 asked the International Atomic Energy Agency for help in building two atomic power plants.

Nigeria commissioned its first nuclear reactor, a small academic research reactor at Ahmadu Bello University in the northern city of Zaria, in 2004.

Nigeria has said it is seeking nuclear technology for peaceful purposes and has ratified the non-proliferation treaty.

President Olusegun Obasanjo has spent 2.5 billion dollars of recent windfall oil earnings to build seven new gas-fired plants after millions poured into the ageing power stations in the last seven years failed to lift output.

The government has said generation should hit 10,000 MW by 2008 when the new plants come on stream.

Isoun did not say where the planned nuclear power stations would be located. Nigeria's oil and gas industry is in the southern Niger Delta, which is plagued by frequent militant attacks on industrial facilities and other security problems.

REUTERS BDP RAI2246

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