The Ministry of Energy and Green Transition has launched a nationwide forensic safety exercise across all power substations following the fire that damaged parts of the Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) substation within the Akosombo Hydroelectric Dam complex on April 23, 2026.
The exercise is aimed at assessing safety standards at power facilities across the country, while also supporting the replacement of more than 3,000 transformers, some of which have been in use for decades and are contributing to unstable power supply in certain communities.
Speaking in an interview in Accra yesterday, the Ministry’s spokesperson, Mr Richmond Rockson, said the government was actively addressing structural challenges in the power sector, noting that although some areas still experience instability, overall generation had improved compared to previous periods.
“The first issue we face is a generation gap, so our focus is on closing it. Since we took office in January 2025, we reduced load by 270 megawatts in February, 203 megawatts in March, and 211 megawatts in April. Since then, we have not shared any load,” he explained.
Mr Rockson said previous reliance on liquid fuel for power generation had been costly, adding that the government had shifted to natural gas to reduce expenditure.
“Liquid fuels are very costly. The price difference between liquid fuel and natural gas can range between 40 and 50 per cent depending on market conditions. If you spend $1 billion on liquid fuel, gas would cost about $600 million. That is a significant difference, so we have moved away from liquid fuel,” he said.
He further stated that through collaboration within the power sector, six power plants had been secured, adding over 1,000 megawatts of capacity, which was not affected by the Akosombo fire incident.
On debt management, Mr Rockson revealed that negotiations with Independent Power Producers (IPPs) had led to a reduction of about $252 million in outstanding payments.
“The government renegotiated with the IPPs, which resulted in a $252 million reduction in the debt owed. These IPPs agreed to take a haircut, which has helped us significantly,” he stated.
He explained that many of the challenges in power distribution were linked to transformer failures, noting that the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) lost over 1,000 distribution transformers in 2024, most of which were overstretched.
Mr Rockson also highlighted improvements in revenue collection, stating that ECG collected about GH¢13 billion in 2025 more than double previous levels.
According to him, the challenges facing the power sector are structural and go beyond outages alone.
“The power sector has deep structural challenges, and we are working to address every layer through reforms and a complete overhaul to build a more reliable system,” he said.
He added that continued engagement with stakeholders, including government, civil society and the public, was essential in resolving the sector’s challenges sustainably.
“We have a better power sector than what we inherited, which was quite poor. Continuous engagement is important to harness ideas and solve these issues once and for all,” he said.
BY BERNARD BENGHAN
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