BPA, VRA merger committee to begin work
Bui Power Authority (BPA) and the Volta River Authority (VRA) merger committee, will hold its maiden meeting, on Tuesday, December 12.
Mr Fred Oware, the Chief Executive Officer of the BPA, and a member of the BPA/VRA merger committee, disclosed this, on Monday at the maiden BPA Editor’s Breakfast Meeting in Accra.
He explained that the decision to merge the two Authorities was a Cabinet one, based on proposals to restructure the power sector beginning with the duo.
Mr Oware said: “There is a lot of misconception about this project (BPA); First of all, a lot of people think it has not been completed and that we are not generating anything.
“It was never intended to be apart with VRA. Never! We are just about 20 per cent of VRA, but we have the capacity, because of where we stand today with the solar, if we are allowed to grow on the trajectory that we found ourselves.
“The various people we are talking to, and the various sites we have acquired in the Northern, Upper East, and Upper West Regions, which will be capable to give us more solar energy than has been planned nationally”.
He said: “If we are allowed to grow, I am absolutely certain that in the next five years or so, you will be talking to a very huge Authority. And we would want you to carry this message across that BPA is not a white elephant.
“We are working, we have the capacity to expand and lead in the renewable energy market”.
He said the Electricity Company of Ghana, owed the BPA a substantial amount of money, which would be used to pay a quarter of the buyer credit loan, used in the construction of the Bui Hydro Generation Station.
He said the BPA had kept to the repayment schedule of the buyer’s credit loan agreement, whilst the Government was also paying back its concessionary loan.
He said so far BPA had been able to repay a quarter of the loan over the past five years; declaring that “I just want to reassure you that Bui is a very health investment. It’s doing well and is capable of paying the full amount of the loan.
“As a CEO, looking into the future of the renewable energy; this Company has positioned itself to provide the kind of solutions that we want to have in the renewable energy market. And if we are allowed to grow on that trajectory, we shall not disappoint this country.”
Source: GNA