Ghana generates electricity from a hydro-thermal mix with the base
load (about 55% of electricity generation) coming from the Akosombo and
Kpong hydro plants. A third hydro plant, Bui, is still under
construction. In the thermal field, dual plants exist for generating
electricity from crude and gas sources but in more recent times there
has been a reliance on gas because it is a cheaper option. But generation at the Aboadze thermal plant as well as the Sunon
Asogli thermal plant has been affected by the supply shutdown by the
West Africa Gas Pipeline Company (WAPCo), occasioned by destruction of
portions of the Togo-Ghana section of the pipeline by a vessel on the
coast of Lome, Togo, on August 28.
Consequently the authorities initiated load shedding exercise as an interim measure while attempts have been underway to fix the problem. The Government had indicated at the time of the announcement that the load shedding would end by
close of October 2012. However since then other confusing promises have come on board including last one by the President at the IEA debate of 15th November 2012 among others some listed below:
Load shedding to cease by November 30 - VRA .Load shedding to end by December – GRIDCo assures
Ghana: Load Shedding Can't End Before 2015
There is also problem with the publicly advertised load management schedule. It is rather erratic and arbitrary leading to complaints from consumers that the exercise has
rather been made worse. This situation is having a terrible toll on businesses, on industries
and on the livelihood, welfare and social lives of millions of
Ghanaians. The intensity of the ongoing load-shedding makes no sense. As stated earlier, There are two main types of power plants which
generate power for distribution through the national grid - the power
that flows through those overhead lines into your house. There is the
hydro dams and then there is the thermal stations as listed in the table below.
| PLANT | CAPACITY | STATUS BY 2008 |
| Tema Thermal1 | 126 | On stream |
| Temal Thermal 2 | 50 | On stream |
| Mine Reserve Plant | 80 | On stream |
| Sunon – Asogli power plant | 200 | On stream |
| Osagyefo Power Barge | 125 | Litigation |
| Kpone Power Plant | 110 | 2013 |
| CENIT Thermal | 126 | On trial test |
| Takoradi T3 VRA Thermal | 132 | On Trial Test |
| Bui Hydroelectric VRA Hydro | 400 | 2013 |
| CEN POWER Thermal | 110 | 2013 |
| Takoradi T2 ( Steam Comp) | 110 | 2013 |
At the
Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) Presidential debate held on 30th October 2012 at the Radash Hotel in Tamale, a new twist was brought on the energy crisis in Ghana when President John Dramani Mahama gave a far-fetched description. The President said it is caused by gas shortage as a result of
damage to pipelines of the West Africa Gas Pipeline Project. However the fundamental problem is much more and the
concern is that Ghanaians were not told the truth about the load shedding
problem.
There are 6 thermal plants, three of which have 3 choices of fuel - gas, light crude, and diesel. Two can use either gas or diesel. And one - the Chinese one masterminded by Togbe Afede - uses only gas (though the machines can also use diesel). Gas is usually the cheapest fuel.
Even more interestingly, we need only about 200 million cubic feet of gas a day to power all the thermal plants at a cost of about $1.2m a day. Because gas has to be carried in pipelines, Nigeria is the only practical source. So we co-invested with some multinational oil companies and the governments of Nigeria, Benin and Togo to create a pipeline to transport Nigeria gas.
We expected about 133 million cubic feet of gas a day, which would have gone a very good way to powering most of our thermal plants at reasonable cost. For reasons that no one has ever properly explained, we get only about 60 million cubic feet, notwithstanding contractual pledges.
30 million cubic feet of this goes to Sunon and 15m to the Tema plant. I presume the remaining 15m goes to the Takoradi plant, but like so many things with our power system, it's murky.
With the 30m cubic feet of gas it receives a day, Sunon produces 180 MW out of the installed capacity of 200 MW.
Here are the questions that must be obvious to you:
1. The lack of gas on its own could only have taken out about 270 MW of power based on the publicly available supply chart. Or a maximum of 360 MW. This is a huge amount of power, but clearly if the rest of the power system was operating normally we should still be seeing production of 1600 MW thereabouts, just 10% below peak load capacity. Why do we have blackouts that frequently throws half the country in darkness. There is a more sinister case of grid decay stuff going on that no one is telling us!
2. Why is Sunon not using diesel oil to keep up a certain level of production when it has turbines that can run on that fuel??? True, it is a private plant, but so far as it sells its power to the VRA the state-owned buyer should have negotiated for backup supply contingency.
3. Who is receiving the 15m cubic feet of gas (in addition to Sunon and Tema)?
4. Why isn't Tema and whoever is receiving that 15m cubic feet of gas per day switching to diesel or light crude, as the case may be? Doing so SHOULD technically mean that the system's supply-demand cycle is only marginally out of balance. And we needn't have load-shedding this bad.
5. What else is the Ministry of Energy not telling us about the mess in the power generation and distribution system?
We can import diesel and light crude from abroad in ship-borne tankers and have been doing so for quite a while. Except that these fuels are expensive and the pricing fluctuates.
If we had a tariff structure that was responsive to the price of fuel and other generation costs, we could run 5 of the thermal plants close to capacity simply by importing the fuel. And provided the rains have been good we can safely generate about 1900 MW even if the one thermal plant that relies on gas alone goes completely offline. But VRA is faced with financial challenges to procure its crude oil requirement for the idle plants because Government has stopped subsidizing the purchase of oil by VRA and has therefore not been allocating to them the quarterly $40 million which the previous Government used to do. The VRA CEO recently complained that Government owes it $300 million. So the matter is simple. Give VRA money to buy crude oil and there will be no load shedding. Gas is cheaper but we could have avoided the load shedding if we were prepared as a nation to spend more rather than wait for the pipelines. Decisive leadership is the answer here.
In the absence of that be prepared to accommodate those Eternally Confused Goons (ECG) continually issuing out "Very Regret Announcements" (VRA) over the Dumsor-Dumsor Mess as Ghanaians Really Intensify Debate Concerning Official (GRIDCO) ineptitude.
Acknowledgments: IMANI Alert Desk; Energy Commission; EEI; Mohammed Amin Adam
