The Ghana National Gas Company’s Atuabo Gas Plant has been shut down for routine maintenance and is scheduled to come back on stream after 15 working days.
[contextly_sidebar id=”zpgNXqDpx4jtLwfdYJqwbaq4kCBnrxTE”]The management of the Plant has assured the public that the shutdown will not affect power supply in the country.
Speaking to Citi News, the Communications Manager at the Ghana Gas Company, Alfred Ogbamey, revealed Ghana Gas is liaising with the Volta River Authority (VRA) and Tullow Oil for this planned maintenance which has been the pipeline for a year.
He said, “This not an unplanned outage. It is planned. What it means is that all the partners and along the value chain are warned and will take adequate measures to keep the generation of power ongoing.”
Mr Ogbamey reiterated assurances already made by the Power Minister saying the VRA will be putting in place measures to keep sure the thermal processing plant at Aboadze will keep running albeit at a higher cost.
“What will happen is that VRA will take enough measures to keep Aboadze going. It will come at a cost, at a higher cost certainly.”
“So far as I am concerned, there should be no fear…” he concluded.
The Ministry of Power earlier rejected claims the shutdown of the Atuabo gas plant for routine maintenance would bring about intense load shedding in the country.
According to the Power Ministry, VRA with the support of the government has procured some 600,000 barrels of Light Crude Oil (LCO) to run the Aboadze Thermal Plants.
The country is expected to lose some 600 megawatts of power following this shutdown.
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By Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana