Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia
The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has lamented the inability of the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) to operate at optimum level in the country.
He says the company is struggling with transmission challenges as a result of obsolete distribution equipment.
Explaining the recent power cuts at a town hall meeting on Wednesday, Dr. Bawumia insisted that Ghana is producing enough power but GRIDCO, the power distribution company, is unable to distribute it due to its old systems.
“Even though we don’t have problems with power generation capacity, we have some problems with the transmission. The GRIDCO network is old and it has been unable to invest in high capacity lines because of financial difficulties.”
Dr. Bawumia also disclosed that the country is currently paying an amount of $24 million per month for unused power under the agreement with the Independent Power Producers.
He said there are fears that amount may double this year.
“The energy sector is key for industrialization. We inherited many challenges in the sector but they are being addressed. Ghana has excess capacity in energy generation but the contracts entered into for many of these IPPs are expensive and financially burdensome. Most of these contracts are ‘take or pay’ arrangements. This means that even if we don’t need the power, we still have to pay for it. Ghana is currently paying $24 million a month in excess capacity charges alone for power we have not used. This will increase to about $41 million a month later this year, with the coming onstream of CEN Power, Early Power and Amandi power plants.”