The Volta River Authority (VRA) says it has positioned itself to contain the over 10 per cent increase in power consumption in the country, by stepping up its power generation capacity, and thus anticipates no power problems this and subsequent years to come.

Ing. I. Kirk Koffi, Deputy Chief Executive, Engineering & Operations at VRA, who spoke to The Chronicle on the sidelines of a three-day work shop on Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) financing in Accra last week, hinted that the VRA was considering a wind farm project to add to their portfolio, and expected to be able to generate an additional 50 megawatts of power.

In addition, the VRA is also working at generating 70 per cent hydro and 30 per cent thermal energy to take care of the country's energy needs. Ing. I. Kirk Koffi stated that though the wind farm project was capital intensive, its long term benefit at complementing the energy needs of the country, was enormous.

He added that when these projects, which he expects to be undertaken and completed this year, come to fruition, the country would have no problems with power as the authority would have enough power to supply. The Head of Public Relations at the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo), Mr. Albert Kwasi Quainoo, earlier told The Chronicle of an excess 33 MVA excess power supplied the Electricity Company of Ghana to help solve the energy problems in the city.

He indicated that since Accra takes the greater part of the load countrywide, GRIDCo intends to have other sub-stations and transformers in the city by the end of next year, to absorb the increasing loads in the city. Source: Daniel Nonor, Email (k2dan@yahoo.com) - Ghanaian Chronicle