APPLICATION OF ICT TO THE NIGERIAN NATIONAL GRID USING

NEPLAN
BY
Emeka O. Okorie
mnse, mnieee, mieee, C.Eng.
Federal Polytechnic Nekede, Department of Electrical/Electronics Engineering,
P.M.B. 1036 Owerri, Imo State
Nigeria
okoriemeka@ieee.org
ABSTRACT
NEPLAN is a very user friendly planning and information system simulation software for electrical
power systems analysis such as Load Flow, Fault level calculations, Transient stability, Voltage
stability, and Motor starting.
Electrical energy is supplied by the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (P.H.C.N.) to consumers
from generating stations (which are interconnected to the National Grid) through transmission
lines, to substations located at different areas around the country.
The challenge of the century is the ability of Power Systems/Control Engineers to access the
power/load flow and ascertain the effects of short/open circuits on the entire National Grid at
various points in the network at a glance. This paper has examined critically these problems on
the Nigerian National Grid and has proposed options of overcoming them using the NEPLAN
(which is ICT based) for the Eastern National Grid as a case study.
Keywords: NEPLAN, National Grid and Information and Communication Technology (ICT).

1.0. INTRODUCTION

The application of information and communication technologies to teaching, research and

administration by the use of NEPLAN (a very user friendly planning and information
system simulation software for electrical power systems analysis such as Load Flow,
Fault level calculations, Transient stability, Voltage stability, and Motor starting) in

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Nigeria is yet another breakthrough in the application of ICT to meet the ever increasing
technological challenges of the 21st century.
A typical NEPLAN (V5) environment has the following features in the User Interface,
numbered as attached in the appendix (fig. 1.0):
1. Title barThis displays the tile of the present software and the present project file name.
2. Menu option barThis is the bar that contains all the menus with their commands that enables us to work
comfortable with the NEPLAN environment.
3. ToolbarAll command buttons are equipped with balloon help texts, which pop up when the
cursor is held still at the button for a moment without pressing any keys. Many
commands, which can be accessed in the Toolbar, may be found as well in the
respective menus. Others, mainly the graphical commands can only be accessed in the
Toolbar .
4. Workspace with diagrams and data tablesIn the Workspace the different diagrams can be opened. The same diagrams may be
used for entering the network, building control circuits or sketching drawings.
5. Variant ManagerThe Variant Manager gives a good overview of the open projects and variants. New
projects and variants may be managed, which means that they can be deleted, added,
activated or deactivated. From the Variant Manager, the user can switch to the Diagram
Manager, which administrates the open Diagrams with its graphic layers.

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6. Symbol WindowThis contains all the element symbols available. Apart from the standard symbol for
some elements, there exist other symbols with a different graphical appearance but
exactly the same characteristics. New symbols also can be created or existing symbols
may be modified with the Symbol Library.
7. Message WindowThis is the channel used to communicate with the user. It supplies information about
the executed processes, error messages and further information.
8. Status barIndicates the exact status of the simulation at any given time.
1.1. BENEFITS TO ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING STUDENTS / POWER
SYSTEMS ENGINEERS / POWER UTILITIES:
NEPLAN simulation software enables the students/Engineers carry out (accurate) load
flow analyses/solutions of a power system using Gauss Seidel, Newton Ralphson, Fast
Decoupled, (etc) methods in a matter of minutes; The Nigerian national grid network can
be seen at a glance; Effects of overloading/short circuit/faults in any part of the grid can
be simulated, seen at a glance and remedied from the comfort of a computer system in a
remote location; The effect of contributions of Independent Power Plants (IPPs) can
immediately be ascertained long before their generated power is injected into the national
grid; Excellent long term electrical power consumption forecast is achievable using
NEPLAN; The need of adequate compensating equipment and their locations can easily
be determined. Etc.

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2.0 CHALLENGES FACED IN THE NATIONAL GRID WITHOUT NEPLAN

Till date, Power Holding Company of Nigeria manually traces faults on feeders of our
national grid which has resulted (and is still resulting) to several days of outages to
consumers. Thus, the challenge of the century is the ability of Power Systems/Control
Engineers to access the power/load flow and ascertain the effects of short/open circuits on
the entire National Grid at various points in the network at a glance and be able to
specifically discover exact locations of faults in the shortest possible time.
3.0 NATIONAL GRID WITH NEPLAN
The application of information and communication technologies to teaching, research and
administration by the use of NEPLAN in Nigeria can overcome the challenges currently
being faced by our Engineers on our national grid. NEPLAN simulation software has
been used for the design of the Eastern National Grid as a case study and can be seen as
attached in fig.3.0 of the appendix. Running the load flow simulation of the eastern grid
network gives the expected calculated parameters as shown in fig. 3.1. This pictorial view
of the eastern grid network makes the lives of the servicing engineer and Power
Systems/Control Engineers easy on the network.
4.0 CONCLUSION
The effective use of NEPLAN simulation software (which is an application of
information and communication technologies to teaching, research and administration)
for the design and analysis of our national grid will:
Allow our Engineers give excellent long term electrical power consumption
forecast (as present system overloads are clearly and accurately indicated).

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 Ensure that overloaded lines and feeders are easily detected and corrected either
by transferring loads to under loaded lines/feeders or creating a new line/feeder
entirely. (The effect of these actions can be simulated first on a computer system
before practical implementation)
Provide for adequate compensating equipment where necessary and their
locations can easily be determined as in figs 3.0 and 3.1.
Ensure that a fault occurring in any part of the grid network will be
localized/detected within the shortest possible time.
Allow

the

determination

of

the

exact

contributions

of

new

generating/transmission stations and their effects on the national grid before they
are actually constructed. Etc.

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5.0 APPENDIX

Fig 1.0 Window features in the user interface

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Fig 3.0 NEPLAN - EASTERN GRID NETWORK

7

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Fig 3.1 NEPLAN - EASTERN GRID NETWORK WITH LOAD FLOW SIMULATION
(Colours indicate network condition. E.g. colour red indicates overloaded feeders/Lines.)
8

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REFERENCE
[1] Nwankwo O.I. (1998) Marginal Cost Pricing Alternative Pricing and Load
Management Method. Paper presented at the annual conference of the
National Electric Power Authority, Lagos.
[2] Okorie E. O. Okafor E.N.C. (2006) Wireless Power Transmission SystemPermanent Solution to Electrical Power Theft Transmission And
Distribution

Problem.

INTER-WORLD

Journal

Of

Science

And

Technology, 2(4), 100-111.

[3] Gupta J.B. (2004). A Course In Power Systems. New Delhi: S.K. Kataria and Sons.
[4] http://www.neplan.ch

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