The Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) has announced that power has been restored in the regions in the north following a brief disruption in the early morning of Wednesday, February 7, 2024.
The company in a statement revealed that the outage occurred at 5:29 am due to a tripped 330/161kV autotransformer at the Kintampo substation, impacting the Anwomaso-Kumasi Transmission Line and triggering a system-wide disturbance.
GRIDCo’s swift response to the challenge ensured full power restoration by 7:35 am, minimizing inconvenience caused to customers in the affected regions.
The company apologized for the inconvenience caused to the people in the affected areas.
Find the full statement below;
Meanwhile, the staff of (GRIDCo) have threatened to shut down power plants, and plunge the country into outages popularly known as ‘dumsor,’ if the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) fails to clear its debt.
In a letter signed by Wisdom Kojo Adenyo, the Senior Staff Association’s National Chairman and addressed to the Minister of Energy, the Board Chairman, and the Chief Executive of GRIDCo, in December last year, the aggrieved staff noted that there will be a return of ‘dumsor’ if the financial status of the company is not improved with immediate effect.
They explained that GRIDCo bills ECG – their major customer – over GH₵100 million per month, out of which only about 18% to 25% is paid, and in an irregular manner.
“The chunk of the revenue sits in our books without any plans to redeem same. This situation has made it difficult to pay suppliers and procure the requisite tools, materials, and spares, all of which adversely affect the business,” the statement added.
According to the staff of GRIDCo, the ongoing challenges in the cash flow of the company have implications not only on their operations but also on the service delivery to customers and the general welfare of staff.
“The main cause of the poor cash flow situation is because the Cash Waterfall Mechanism, which is used as the mode of payment to the industry players within the sector, is not working and is suspected to have been discontinued,” they stated.