President John Dramani Mahama has inaugurated the first unit of the second phase of the Sunon Asogli power plant that will supply an additional 180 megawatts of power to the national grid.

The Sunon Asogli power plant second combined cycle gas turbine is expected to generate 360 megawatts of power when fully completed.

The first unit of the phase II project will boost the country’s power generation capacity and help meet the growing demand for electricity.

It will also help the country to gradually reduce its dependence on hydroelectric power which constitutes more than half of the country’s generation capacity.

Tangible benefits

At the ceremony at Kpone, President Mahama said Ghana's power generation capacity had improved significantly, following the various interventions put in place by the government, which had eliminated the frustrating load-management schedule.

He stated that completion of the Asogli phase II would further be augmented by the Volta River Authority's Kpone plant and many other initiatives put in place to generate 5,000 megawatts targeted by the government.

He said the Asogli phase II, when fully completed, would contribute 360 megawatts of power which would help to give more meaning to the government’s vision to make Ghana the power hub of West Africa.

Stranded gas

President Mahama said the low supply of gas from the West African Gas Pipeline project had created a situation where there had been almost 750 megawatts of stranded thermal access in the Eastern power enclave in Tema.

To resolve that problem, he said the government was accelerating the West to east reverse flow project to enable the transfer of excess gas from the gas fields in the West to fire thermal plants in the Eastern corridor.

In the interim, President Mahama said Ghana had signed an agreement with Messrs Quantum Energy and Sahara for the deployment of two floating storage regasification units to supply energy to the Eastern power enclave.

Lasting friendship

The Chairman of the China People’s Political Consultative Conference, Mr Yu Zhengsheng, who is on an official visit to Ghana, said the Sunon Asogli power plant was the fruit of the economic cooperation and the symbol of lasting friendship between Ghana and China.

He joined President Mahama and Togbe Afede XIV, Chairman of World Trade Centre Accra at the inauguration of the first unit of the second phase of the Asogli power plant.
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Phase one

The President of the Shenzhen Energy, Mr Wang Huinong, said phase one of the Asogli power plant, which was completed in 2010, had since supplied 550 million kilowatts of power to the national grid and significantly reduced the power generation challenges in Ghana.

When the phase II is fully completed, the Sunon Asogli Power plant is expected to meet 20 per cent of Ghana’s power demand and hopefully support the export of power to other neighbouring West African countries such as Benin and Togo.