General News of Saturday, 19 July 2014

Source: GNA

Gov’t steps up efforts to improve power supply

The government has taken a number of measures to improve electricity supply to Kumasi and other parts of the Ashanti Region.

These include the installation of a new 130 megawatts bulk supply point (BSP) at Anwomaso, and the construction of workshops and stock yard for cables, transformers, poles and other materials at Boadi.

Added to these, is the building of two separate administrative blocks for the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) for efficient service delivery to consumers.

Mr John Abu Jinapor, Deputy Minister of Energy and Petroleum Resources on Thursday inspected these projects to assess the progress of work.

The ECG Network Projects Director, Mr Samuel Boakye-Appiah, informed him that the BSP was almost ready and that they had been carrying out tests run.

Together with the existing 250 megawatts from the Ridge supply point, there would now be 380 megawatts of electricity that would help to significantly tackle the distribution challenges in the region.

He said the situation where the company kept materials and other logistics for the Kumasi East and West Offices at a depot in Tema, would end after completion of the workshops and stock yard.

This, he noted, would tremendously enhance their operations.

Mr Jinapor expressed satisfaction with both the pace and quality of work done by the contractors, and said the projects would assure the people of reliable power supply.

He spoke of the determination of the government to ensure a substantial increase of the power generation mix.