Nigeria got $3.65bn World Bank power funding, yet blackouts persist

Nigeria’s power sector has attracted at least $3.653 billion in World Bank-backed funding since 2001, but persistent grid failures, inadequate generation and unreliable electricity supply continue to affect millions of consumers.

Nigeria’s electricity sector has received at least $3.653 billion in World Bank-backed funding over the past 24 years, yet millions of households and businesses across the country continue to grapple with unstable power supply, frequent grid collapses and heavy reliance on generators. An analysis of World Bank-supported power projects between 2001 and 2024 showed that successive interventions targeted transmission upgrades, sector reforms, rural electrification, renewable energy expansion and recovery programmes aimed at stabilising the country’s troubled electricity industry.

According to data from the World Bank, as reported by Statisense, the projects include the $100 million Transmission Development Project introduced in 2001, the $172 million National Energy Development Project in 2005 and the $400 million Nigeria Electricity and Gas Improvement Project launched in 2009. Other interventions include the $145 million Nigeria Power Sector Guarantees Project in 2014, the $486 million Nigeria Electricity Transmission Project and the $350 million Nigeria Electrification Project in 2018, the $750 million Power Sector Recovery Programme approved in 2020, the $750 million Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-up programme introduced in 2023 and the $500 million Sustainable Power and Irrigation for Nigeria project launched in 2024.

The cumulative funding from the projects totals about $3.653 billion, excluding regional interconnector and hydro rehabilitation projects for which no exact figures were provided. Despite the multi-billion-dollar interventions, Nigeria’s electricity supply has remained inadequate for its growing population and industrial demand. The national grid has continued to suffer repeated collapses, while power generation has largely remained below expectations for Africa’s most populous country. Many households and businesses still depend heavily on petrol and diesel generators due to unreliable supply from distribution companies, with industry experts attributing the crisis to weak transmission infrastructure, liquidity shortfalls in the power market, gas supply constraints, vandalism, inadequate investment and policy inconsistencies.

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