World Bank, ADB finance project

September 15, 2008 pg 3

Story: Musah Yahaya Jafaru

THE World Bank, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and other financiers are jointly financing the Ghana Energy Development and Access Project with $94.5 million for the next five years towards the expansion and rehabilitation of Electricity Company of Ghana’s network.
A further $75 million has been allocated for rural electrification. The government is also supporting the ECG’s investment projects with GH¢55 million from this year’s budget.
The Managing Director of ECG, Mr Jude O. Adu-Amankwah, who announced this at a meeting with editors in Accra last Friday, said the projects were part of strategies to revamp the ECG’s network infrastructure in order to improve upon the quality and reliability of power supply in ECG operational areas.
He mentioned the replacement of all credit meters with pre-paid meters in Accra and all towns in the next three years, the upgrading of transmission and distribution networks to provide firm capacity and alternative sources of supply as some of the strategies adopted to overcome ECG’s technical challenges.
Mr Adu-Amankwah said the company would install shunt capacitor banks at primary substations to improve system voltages and reduce technical losses, and also introduce live line work to reduce customer lost hours during fault resolution and restoration.
He said as a way of modernising ECG’s operations, the company would install facilities to ensure effective voice and data transfer and networking of its vending stations and computerise the company’s network database.
Mr Adu-Amankwah said the ECG was currently implementing investment projects aimed at expanding and rehabilitating its sub transmission and distribution network.
He said the projects included the construction of a third BSP in Accra, a second BSP in Kumasi and the upgrade of Mallam BSP, the provision of switching stations at strategic locations, namely Jasikan, Bogoso, Dodowa, Akuse, Kasoa and Bunso.
Besides, Mr Adu-Amankwah said, the ECG was funding the installation of shunt capacitor banks at selected primary substations, the implementation of High Voltage Distribution System in Accra and injection of primary and secondary substations in all the regions.
Again, he said under the distribution engineering and geographical information systems, the project would enable ECG to computerise its network and customer database and improve trouble call and response to faults and ECG network asset management.
Mr Adu-Amankwah said the projects would address ECG’s technical and commercial challenges and overturn the weakening financial position of the company.
He said the projects were expected to reduce the system loss by one per cent every year and on the average reduce by 20 hours of annual unplanned outages per customer per year.
“When these results are achieved, the company would have substantially achieved its desire to provide quality electricity supply to its customers and also attain international benchmarks set by the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) for ECG over the next five years,” he stressed.
Mr Adu-Amankwah mentioned the construction of four primary substations and rehabilitation of some existing ones in Accra and Kumasi, the construction of one primary substation at Ofankor and the replacement of obsolete and faulty equipment in Accra, Ho and Tema as some of the completed investment projects.