TCN restores Funtua substation electricity after Kano DisCo fire

The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) said it has restored bulk electricity supply to Funtua Transmission Substation, in Katsina State, after fire from a faulty Kano DisCo 33kV line affected the substation’s protection and control panel.

A statement by the GM (Public Affairs), TCN said the recent incident began with explosion sound accompanied by thick smoke and blinding flame at the upriser of Dandume 33kV feeder belonging to Kano Electricity Distribution Company (KEDCO) in Funtua.

TCN said inquest shows the fire was due to earth fault resulting from the faulty 33kV armoured cable in the adjoining KEDCO station.

Prior to the incident, TCN said KEDCO had taken planned outage from Zaria132/33kV

Transmission Substation which caused loss of supply to the Funtua substation. It said the maintenance was completed before the fire incident.

TCN commended efforts of the Katsina State Fire Service, Funtua for their prompt response to the site of the incident, saying that they prevented the fire from escalating and doing greater damage to the substation.

It said immediately after the fire was put off, a combined team of TCN engineers from its Gusau and Mando Work Centres commenced work to effect repairs and that power supply has been restored but with partial load-shedding until the 7.5MVA transformer is restored.

The company noted that it was not the first time a DisCo would be causing the loss of TCN’s installations, noting that the only way the massive investments TCN is making in the nation’s transmission grid would be felt by electricity consumers “would be if the DisCos start making appropriate and extensive investments in their distribution networks.”