Lagos State plans to raise its electricity supply from under 1,000 megawatts to more than 3,000 megawatts by March 2027, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu announced on October 11, 2026, with the target delivered by Deputy Governor Dr Kadri Obafemi Hamzat at the fourth Lagos Business School Africa Energy Conference in Lagos.
The additional roughly 2,000 megawatts is to be mobilised from a mix of sources, national grid allocation, independent power projects, energy hubs, power barges, energy traders and embedded generation, under what the state calls a seven-point plan covering market structure, generation, distribution, transmission, metering, gas-to-power arrangements and digital market-visibility tools including SCADA and an Advanced Metering Infrastructure rollout.
The plan builds on groundwork laid earlier in the year. In May 2026, the Lagos State Electricity Regulatory Commission approved 14 electricity licences and permits spanning off-grid, embedded, distribution, metering and mini-grid operations, while the state had separately set out an earlier target of 2,000MW of new embedded power through private sector partnerships, alongside transmission upgrades including a new 132kV line from Ajah through Eleko Junction to Alaro City.
Officials describe the ambition as ending blackouts and building what the state calls a 24-hour power economy, with government positioning itself to create licensing, land and contractual conditions for private investment, not to build or own generation itself.
Why this matters
A state actively building the market Nova operates in
Lagos is Nigeria’s largest electricity market and the one where Nova’s businesses, including Sapio Utilities’ captive and embedded power and Nova Blueline Power’s rail-corridor supply, already operate. A state government setting an explicit multi-gigawatt target, sourced substantially from embedded generation, power barges and private IPPs, not the national grid, is spelling out exactly what it wants built: distributed capacity, privately financed, close to demand.
Fourteen new LASERC permits in May alone, plus the state’s own talk of needing commercially viable terms for private investment, show a market actively widening its roster of credible private power counterparties. For developers already serving Lagos’s commercial and industrial base, that is good news, not a threat.