Electricity tariffs to go up – VRA

• Posted on September 8, 2014
• by Nana Kwesi Coomson
• Comment

The Volta River Authority (VRA) has hinted that electricity tariffs are likely to go up again between October and December.

Barely three months ago, electricity tariffs went up 12 percent and 6 percent for water.

According to the Chief Executive of VRA Kirk Koffi, the price adjustment is crucial to sending the right signals to potential independent power producers that Ghana is managing the energy sector well.

But there are fears that any further hikes in utility prices will worsen the economic plight of many Ghanaians.

He further assured Ghanaians that “things are going to be better” very soon.

“The people who are managing the sector are Ghanaians who have been managing this all these years,”he said.

He further explained that most of the challenges the country is facing in the energy sector are as a result of low inflow of gas from Nigeria and one or two other technical challenges.

“These problems are not permanent, they will be over very soon and we should be ok.”

This is because gas supply from the Nigerian government’s producer N-Gas has been erratic and below expectation.

Mr. Kirk Koffi who disclosed this to Citi News said the gas from the Nigerian independent producers together with the soon-to-be completed Ghana Gas project will improve the energy situation tremendously.

“We have already started talking to a number of private gas producers in Nigeria to help get us more gas and we are assured we will get more gas from Nigeria early next year,”he said.

Meanwhile, then Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has intensified its load shedding exercise in the southern part of the country.

In a related development, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Volta River Authority (VRA) for the establishment of power plants to augment Ghana’s energy capacity.

The Head of the IFC’s Africa Special Initiative for Infrastructure, Richard Arkutu,  told Citi News the MoU will allow the Corporation to collaborate with the VRA and identify international developers that will help it [VRA] achieve the government’s planned installed capacity target of 5,000 megawatts by 2016.

“We will help VRA identify and shortlist the projects they want to embark on and help them with the feasibility study work.” he explained.

By: Marian Efe Ansah