Deputy Energy Minister, Andrew Egyapa Mercer, has confirmed that all power plants in Ghana are currently running at full capacity to ensure a stable supply of electricity.
He mentioned that the Systems Control Centre, which monitors and manages the power grid, has reported no outages for several days in a row.
Mr. Mercer explained on JoyNews‘ Newsfile that, the West African Gas Pipeline Company (WAPCo) had to reduce the volume of gas it was transporting, which led to a shortfall.
According to him, the government had to reduce the amount of gas being exported to curtail the shortage.
“Probably some grid-related issues may account for the outages people encountered in their homes during that period,” he said on Saturday, January 13, 2024.
“When it comes to the issue of generation itself per se, the information that I have is that, apart from the 9th and some hours into the 10th where we had up to 700 megawatts of power taken off. So we had to cut our export to reduce that 700 to about 510, we haven’t had any deficit in generation in the domestic market from the 9th of the 12th till date.”
The Deputy Energy Minister stated that he had a meeting with the CEO of WAPCO, during which they discussed the need for WAPCO to give them time to work with the Ministry of Finance to secure the necessary approvals to pay the deficit that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) owes.
He stated that WAPco did not grant the ECG more time to be able to pay the deficit, and as a result, the power was cut off but restored later on.
“I can assure our listeners that this eventuality relative to payment of WAPco’s services will not recur.”
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