The Federal Government has selected two sites for the construction of the planned nuclear power plants, as Nigeria tries to end decades of electricity blackouts that have blighted its growth, Reuters reports.
Russia’s state-owned Rosatom, which has been in talks with the government over the nuclear plants, on Friday confirmed two sites had been selected in the country and said they would have a total of four reactors.
Neither side would say where the sites were, but a source at Nigeria’s nuclear agency told Reuters the sites will be in Akwa Ibom State, in south-south Nigeria, and Kogi State, in the central northern part of the country.
Nigeria, with a population of around 170 million, has installed power capacity that fluctuates between around 6,000MW to just over 7,000MW, according to the Transmission Company of Nigeria, with 80 percent of its power plants fired by gas.
By comparison, South Africa’s capacity is almost seven times greater for a population less than a third as big.
Nigeria has no experience in developing and operating nuclear plants but has small reactors producing around 30 KW for research, Reuters quoted Franklin Erepamo Osaisai, Chief executive of the Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission, as saying on the commission’s website.
One nuclear power plant costs between $5 billion to $8 billion, a source at Rosatom said.
However, Nigeria has not yet said how it plans to fund the construction, a key question given its finances have taken a hit after a slump in the price of oil, its main export.
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