KAINJI DAM BURST: OPERATORS DEBUNK REPORTS
Fears of electricity generation collapse emerged yesterday after news reports circulated that there was a burst at the Kainji Dam, Nigeria's main hydroelectric dam.
However, the Management of Mainstream Energy Solutions Limited (MESL), operators of the Kainji and Jebba Hydro Power Plants has urged Nigerians to disregard trending reports of the burst, describing it as 'totally false news'.
MESL Head of Corporate Communication, Olugbenga Adebola, in a statement on Monday, September 14, noted that the dam is safe and is in full operations and currently supplying power to the national grid.
MESL claimed that its full operation could be confirmed from the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) and the National Control Centre (NCC) who are the dispatchers to the national grid.
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"The Kainji Hydropower Plant is currently carrying out water spillage exercise to regulate the water flow along the river Niger. The dam reservoir is currently not at its fullest capacity and will not be in the coming months; therefore bursting its banks does not arise.
"This is an exercise carried out annually to ensure that the reservoir is well secured and that the expected flow of water along the River Niger and its tributaries are controlled," the statement read.
According to Adebola, the MESL engineers are working tediously to ensure that power is supplied across the country at the same time, secure the dam.
The Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) corroborating MESL's claim, urged the general public to disregard earlier reports of a burst in Kainji Dam, describing it as 'fake news'.
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NIHSA Director-General, Mr Clement Nze, noted that the dam is safe, stating that nothing of such occurred in the dam.
According to him, the Nigeria hydrological services agency works in synergy with operators of all major dams across the country, and have not reported any occurrence.
Kainji Dam is located in New Bussa town, Borgu Local Government Area of Niger. It was designed to have the generating capacity of 960 megawatts (1,290,000 hp). The dam generates electricity for all the large cities in Nigeria, including the neighbouring country of Niger Republic.
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