WILLAIM HUTTON-Mensah, Acting Managing Director of the Electricity Company of Ghana says the high demand for electricity in the country is responsible for the recent power fluctuations.

He said even though the company was investing massively into the establishment of more sub-stations across the country, this could not come without a few hitches.

He was speaking to CITY & BUSINESS GUIDE during the 9th Annual National ECG Employees Awards in Accra.

Mr Hutton-Mensah said ECG had also had to fix obsolete equipment and in most cases, replace them at high costs to the company, citing the recent breakdown of the Mallam Substation as an example.

“There is a challenge for meeting the capacity that comes with the demand and what we are doing now is to embark on various projects.”

On the huge indebtedness of corporate customers to the company, the acting MD said some had honoured their bills while others were yet to do so.

Inusah Fuseini, Deputy Minister of Energy, also in an interview with this paper, said Nigeria’s truncation of some 250 megawatts of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) to Ghana recently, affected the Sunon-Asogli Power Plant. “The VRA was using the gas at Tema to generate gas. Clearly, that meant that we would shift to the use of light crude oil (LCO) which actually results in cooking of the gas. If we should use that, it means the nozzles of the machine will choke and bring about inefficiency. Also, there is lack of generation capacity.”

He continued that “ECG is embarking on Substation Reliability and Enhancement Programme (SREP) and investing in technical and non-technical losses. Also, it is putting transformers at short intervals to reduce losses. It is also employing pre-paid meters while GRIDCo is also doing its part.”

Additionally, he said VRA was working hard to increase its installed capacity.

“By June, we would be adding 200 megawatts to the generating capacity of this country. And by 2015, we would be producing 4,000 megawatts power.

Government welcomes independent power producers to come and assist with the situation. Government alone cannot do this.”

Frederick Yidana, Best Sub-transmission Employee, emerged the overall National Best Employee for 2011.

Mr Yidana was chosen for displaying great ingenuity in his job, particularly for fixing a nagging cable fault that developed on an 11-kiloVolts feeder between some substations supplying power to industries in Accra.