As the dreaded power crisis popularly referred to as “dumsor” appears to be showing signs of a comeback even under the Nana Akufo-Addo government which vowed never to allow Ghanaians relive that experience, I visited the sites of the T3 and Osagyefo thermal plants to understand why they have not been working.
T3 THERMAL PLANT
My observations make me ask whether the current administration has forgotten the 132-megawatt T3 plant which has not been operational since 2012.
In a bid to increase the production of power at the Aboadze Thermal Power enclave near Takoradi from the then 550 Megawatts to 682 megawatts, the T3 power project of 132 megawatts combined-cycle plant was started in January 2010, at an estimated cost of 183 million US dollars.
T3 plant
The T3 thermal plant which was a partnership project between the Volta River Authority, the Canadian Commercial Corporation, Magellan Aerospace, HPI and S and W, formed part of the then government’s agenda to increase Ghana’s total power supply from two thousand megawatts to five thousand megawatts by 2015.
Although the construction of the T3 project was completed and duly commissioned by President John Dramani Mahama in the last quarter of 2012, the plant operated and generated power for a little over three months and broke down.
When questions were asked, it was initially blamed on the absence of gas from the West African Gas Pipeline to power the plant.
However, several attempts to sustain T3’s operation on the second test failed even after gas was made available.
Amidst this confusion, came the chief of Aboadze, Nana Atom, blaming the situation on the failure by VRA to pacify the gods of the land as well as compensate the owners of the land used for T3’s construction.
Despite VRA’s allocation of money for rituals on the said land as well as some payment of compensation, the T3 project has since become a white elephant notwithstanding many interventions to fix it.
It has been a little over two years since Nana Akufo-Addo became president after his party and himself heavily criticized then-President Mahama’s handling of the power crisis.
One wonders whether the current New Patriotic Party government led by President Nana Akufo-Addo is aware of the T3 thermal plant that has the capacity to produce 132 megawatts of power.
The question about the state of the 132-megawatt T3 thermal plant has become more relevant today following the recent power outages experienced across the country coupled with conflicting government explanations.
The unannounced outages are already throwing the production plans of both individuals and institutions out of balance, forcing some to revisit their abandoned generators as well as make extra provision for fuel to power these generators.
Productivity for those who do not have the luxury of purchasing generators as well as those who do not work from an office has become unpredictable.
Already some individuals have begun to record damages to their electronic appliances as a result of the unannounced power outages.
For these reasons and the unconvincing explanations by the government over the looming power crises, one wonders if the Nana Addo government is even aware of the 132 megawatts T3 thermal plant at Aboadze!
THE OSAGYEFO BARGE
Osagyefo Barge
The Osagyefo Barge, a 125 megawatts capacity power generation plant which is rotting away at Effasu in the Western Region is another forgotten extra source of power that this administration has failed to utilize.
The 125 megawatts capacity power generation Osagyefo Barge plant was procured at 110 million dollars by the Jerry Rawlings government in 1999 from Italy, under an arrangement between the government and Balkan Energy.
Though delivered in 2002, Balkan Energy agreed to install the plant within ninety days to get the plant running at the Sekondi-Naval base, but this never materialized.
Side view of the Osagyefo barge
Due to difficulties between the government of Ghana and the Balkan Energy, the barge which for years could not generate a watt of power was moved to Efasu in the Jomoro District of the Western Region, where it has remained to date and basically rotting away.
Following disagreement between Ghana and Balkan Energy over how Balkan had handled the barge, the Government of Ghana was granted damages of 300 thousand dollars after arbitration in 2014 but Ghana had to pay 12 million dollars to Balkan Energy for work done.
Following the idleness of the Osagyefo Barge for so many years, it has become so rusty and dangerous to even climb.
Some rusty parts of the barge
The idleness of the plant saw Balkan Energy attempting to sell-off associated components of the Barge as scraps, which were intercepted by the Jomoro Police command in September 2014. Again, in February this year, some two marine police officers together with their accomplices were arrested and are being investigated by the Western Regional Police Command for stealing air conditioners, fridges and other components from the abandoned Osagyefo Barge.
All these happenings together with the recent uncertainty around the dumsor call for the government to make public its programme for the Osageyfo Barge. The question is, is it because the government came to meet enough installed capacity that is why it appears the administration does not care about the 110 million dollars of state funds used to procure the thermal generating plant?
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By: Akwasi Agyei Annim
The author is Citi TV/Citi FM’s Western regional correspondent.