GRIDCo To Invest $230m In Power Infrastructure, June 29, 2011, Spread
The Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) is to raise about $230 million this year from local and international financial markets to invest in the country’s electrical energy infrastructure.
Under the initiative, which feeds into its long-term capital investment plan, GRIDCo will receive 80 million euros from French companies Coface Group and Societe Generale, in partnership with the SG-SSB Bank.
Other collaborators are Korea’s EXIM Bank, which is contributing $70 million, the Cal Bank and the Standard Chartered Bank, which are providing $13 million and $ 25 million, respectively.
The Chief Executive Officer of GRIDCo, Mr Charles A. Darku, told the Daily Graphic on the sidelines of its second annual general meeting (AGM) in Accra yesterday that the French support would be used to finance a project to close the northern loop of the transmission network from Tumu through Han to Wa.
The Korean funds, on the other hand, would be used to build a line from the Aboadze Thermal Plant through Prestea to Kumasi.
In the case of the funds to be provided by the CAL Bank, the support will be pumped into the construction of a third bulk supply point in Accra to provide additional capacity to ease the increasing electricity load in the city, while funds from Standard Chartered Bank will be used for the acquisition of transformer spare parts and the construction of a sub-station at Teshie in Accra.
Delivering a statement earlier at the AGM, Mr Darku had stated that the company ended 2010 on a good note, with a net profit of GH¢59.039 million, representing a 104 per cent increase over the previous year’s income.
He said GRIDCo, in the face of dwindling revenue base and uncertainty over the level of tariff increases to expect later in the year, optimised its working capital, implemented tight capital expenditure control and reduced its cost base, while at the same time it rolled out a five-year capital investment programme.
Ghanaians have been expressing concern over the erratic supply of electricity for both domestic and industrial use.
Some have even suggested that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) is secretly rationing power, but Mr Darku noted, “The five-year capital investment programme phases out the implementation of key projects and programmes needed to stabilise, expand and build a robust transmission network that will assure reliability of supply to customers.”
He said GRIDCo had successfully concluded the development of a comprehensive transmission system master plan study.
The document which, he noted had been rolled out earlier in the year, would serve as a blueprint for the government and other engineering considerations to allow for the systematic expansion of the network.
Giving GRIDCo’s outlook for 2011, he said demand would peak at 1,748MW, representing a 16 per cent growth over the 2010 figure of 1,505MW.
The Board Chairman of the company, Mr Emmanuel Appiah Korang, for his part, said GRIDCo’s five-year plan would, among other objectives, modernise the national inter-connected transmission systems, expand the network and provide redundancy within the network, while developing a number of strategic high voltage transmission inter-connects with neighbouring countries.
He stated that the project would help push the government’s plan to achieve 85 per cent access to electricity by the population and the development of infrastructure to generate and distribute 5,000MW of electricity by 2015.
A Deputy Minister of Energy, Alhaji Inusah Fuseini, in his remarks, commended GRIDCo for its achievements and pledged the government’s commitment to ensure that the energy sector was robust enough to power the economy.
Under the initiative, which feeds into its long-term capital investment plan, GRIDCo will receive 80 million euros from French companies Coface Group and Societe Generale, in partnership with the SG-SSB Bank.
Other collaborators are Korea’s EXIM Bank, which is contributing $70 million, the Cal Bank and the Standard Chartered Bank, which are providing $13 million and $ 25 million, respectively.
The Chief Executive Officer of GRIDCo, Mr Charles A. Darku, told the Daily Graphic on the sidelines of its second annual general meeting (AGM) in Accra yesterday that the French support would be used to finance a project to close the northern loop of the transmission network from Tumu through Han to Wa.
The Korean funds, on the other hand, would be used to build a line from the Aboadze Thermal Plant through Prestea to Kumasi.
In the case of the funds to be provided by the CAL Bank, the support will be pumped into the construction of a third bulk supply point in Accra to provide additional capacity to ease the increasing electricity load in the city, while funds from Standard Chartered Bank will be used for the acquisition of transformer spare parts and the construction of a sub-station at Teshie in Accra.
Delivering a statement earlier at the AGM, Mr Darku had stated that the company ended 2010 on a good note, with a net profit of GH¢59.039 million, representing a 104 per cent increase over the previous year’s income.
He said GRIDCo, in the face of dwindling revenue base and uncertainty over the level of tariff increases to expect later in the year, optimised its working capital, implemented tight capital expenditure control and reduced its cost base, while at the same time it rolled out a five-year capital investment programme.
Ghanaians have been expressing concern over the erratic supply of electricity for both domestic and industrial use.
Some have even suggested that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) is secretly rationing power, but Mr Darku noted, “The five-year capital investment programme phases out the implementation of key projects and programmes needed to stabilise, expand and build a robust transmission network that will assure reliability of supply to customers.”
He said GRIDCo had successfully concluded the development of a comprehensive transmission system master plan study.
The document which, he noted had been rolled out earlier in the year, would serve as a blueprint for the government and other engineering considerations to allow for the systematic expansion of the network.
Giving GRIDCo’s outlook for 2011, he said demand would peak at 1,748MW, representing a 16 per cent growth over the 2010 figure of 1,505MW.
The Board Chairman of the company, Mr Emmanuel Appiah Korang, for his part, said GRIDCo’s five-year plan would, among other objectives, modernise the national inter-connected transmission systems, expand the network and provide redundancy within the network, while developing a number of strategic high voltage transmission inter-connects with neighbouring countries.
He stated that the project would help push the government’s plan to achieve 85 per cent access to electricity by the population and the development of infrastructure to generate and distribute 5,000MW of electricity by 2015.
A Deputy Minister of Energy, Alhaji Inusah Fuseini, in his remarks, commended GRIDCo for its achievements and pledged the government’s commitment to ensure that the energy sector was robust enough to power the economy.
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