A STUDY AND PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF OLORUNSOGO THERMAL POWER PLANT IN NIGERIA

Nigeria with a population of well over 170 million people derives her bulk electricity supply from both Hydro and Thermal power plants. The plants, located in different parts of the country should be such that power should be generated and delivered to consumers efficiently and appropriately. This calls for the need to evaluate the performance of these plants periodically to ensure that they are kept in top form. The Olorunsogo Thermal power plant with an installed capacity of 690MW was studied, analysed and evaluated using data covering 2013 to 2017.The results show that the maximum overall efficiency (32.01%) occurred in 2015 as against the expected value of 40 – 45%. The minimum overall efficiency (25.29%) was recorded in 2017. Similarly, the maximum and minimum overall thermal efficiencies were 32.66% and 25.81% and they occurred in 2015 and 2017 respectively. The reliability figures were 86.54% (maximum), attained in 2015 and 83.79% (minimum) scored in 2016. The international best practice recommends 60% and above for overall efficiency and 75% and above for thermal efficiency and 98% and above for reliability respectively. Comparatively, the calculated values of performance indices fell short of the international standard. Besides, the average overall efficiency in the years under study was 29.0%, the thermal equivalent was 29.6% and the reliability index was 85.6%. These calculated indices definitely vary from the standard, implying that the plant performance has to be improved upon. How this could be done has been suggested