The Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) has explained that recent power outages in the capital and other parts of the country is as a result of planned improvement on its transmission lines and distribution chains to enhance power supply reliability in the country.
“We have been experiencing power interruptions in the network and this has been primarily due to the fact that the transmission system has some weaknesses and bottlenecks which we are trying to address but we have not finished yet. So we have had intermittent outages, sometimes transmission lines tripping of from the south-western part of the country and affecting the entire system particularly Kumasi. This culminated if you remember on March 7, when the entire system collapsed as a result of cascade trips which emanated from the Western Region.
“Beyond this, Ashanti Region, in particular Kumasi has been experiencing intermittent outages particularly in the evenings during peak times. And all these is basically because of the fact that our power system has grown in terms of demand. In fact, for the first time this year, we have crossed 3,000 megawatts in terms of demand,” he said.
Speaking at a press briefing in Accra on Thursday April 1, 2021, Director of System Operations, Engineer Mark Baah clarified that recent power outages in some parts of the country is not as a result of generation shortages. According to him, there are no plans to put Ghanaians in a period of erratic power supply popularly referred to as “dumsor” and that, the power outages being experienced in parts of the country is as a result of routine improvement works on some key projects GRIDCo is carrying out.
These projects Mr. Baah said are the Millennium Development Authority (MIDA) funded Pokuase substation, Kasoa Bulk Supply Point installations and the French Development Agency (AFD) funded Tema-Accra transmission line reinforcement project.
His clarification follows a disclosure made by the Corporate Communications Manager for GRIDCo, Ebenezer Amankwaah to the effect that the company was engaging the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to decide on how best to go about the outages in order not to every impact Ghanaians.
However, Mr. Baah explained that GRIDCo has no intention on embarking on a nationwide load-shedding programme but for improvement works on some key projects to enhance the power supply in the country. He said, when necessary, it will in collaboration with contractors and other relevant stakeholders come out with a power-shedding guide to ensure that contractors are able to finish these improvement works on time.
Source: MOI (PR Unit)
