Ghana, previously perceived as a haven of continuous light, is currently experiencing between 550 and 600 megawatts of power shortfall on its national electricity grid.
That, according to the Public Relations Officer of the Electricity Company of Ghana, Mr William Boateng, is the reason why the company is considering the introduction of a 24-hour power rationing schedule, under which specific areas would have power shut down for 24 hours while others have power for 24 hours.
Speaking at a stake holders crisis meeting in Accra to review the power supply situation for the management of the sector to firm up its decision to implement the proposed timetable regime, Boateng said the ECG would implemented 24-hour lights-on, lights-off scheme only if the current situation continued.
“The shortfall represents about a third of the entire 2,000 MW of power generated for distribution, and the reason why the ECG can no longer operate with the initial load-shedding timetable which was designed to shed between 300 and 400 MW of power”, he explained.
Individuals and businesses are currently faced with challenges associated with intermittent power supply. Some areas in the country have experienced power outage for close to two days, while others have only two hours of power, with some businesses compelled to close down.
Describing the situation as “worsening”, he said the ECG was also having its fair share of the situation, which sometimes led to the shutdown of its transmissions, citing the incident which happened at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, when sensitive areas of the hospital including operating theatres were suddenly cut off.
“The more the situation worsens at the generation points, the more it translates into less distribution of power,” he said.
Mr Boateng indicated that the energy crisis in the country had always been a generation problem, not distribution, which was the mandate of the ECG.
For their part, officials of the Volta River Authority (VRA), attributed the current challenges to the drop in the water level at the Akosombo generation plant, unreliable gas supply to thermal plants from the West African Gas Pipeline Company and regular maintenance schedules.
The Public Relations Officer of the VRA, Mr Samuel Fletcher, explained that the Aboadze thermal plant, which supplied 400 MW, had been shut down for maintenance.
“Another machine at the Akosombo Dam has been shut down due to the low level of the water,” he said, adding that gas supply from Nigeria was 49.7 million standard cubic feet as of October, 15, 2014, a figure which varied from day to day instead of the agreed 120 million cubic feet.
He was, however, optimistic that the situation would improve significantly very soon because the maintenance works had been completed for testing.
Mr Fletcher said the energy situation would improve when ongoing projects such as the Kpone Thermal Power Plant which would produce 110MW were completed in 2015.
In the past 15 years, about 1,000 MW of thermal generation capacity has been added, resulting in Ghana’s current generation capacity of 2,125 MW.
The Akosombo Hydroelectric Power Plant supplies about 1,020 MW of energy, followed by the Bui Dam, which produces 400 MW, with the Aboadze Thermal Plant producing 360 MW and the Takoradi Thermal Plant, 330 MW, while the first solar plant at Punga in the Upper East Region produces 2 MW, giving the country 2,272 MW of combined electricity supply.
Thermal power plants to produce 500 MW have been installed and inaugurated in Tema at various times. Some of them are public projects, but most of the capacity is private (Sunon Asogli — 200 MW) or semi-private (CENIT — 126 MW).
Several thermal generation projects, totalling over 1,000 MW, are currently at various stages of development by both public and private operators.
These projects include Kpone (Alstom), Sunon Asogli Expansion, Takoradi 2 combined-cycle expansion, CENIT/TT1PP expansion and Takoradi 3 expansion.
The country still faces unreliable and inadequate power supply, despite the generation capacity made up of about 50 per cent hydro and 50 per cent thermal.