The Volta River Authority (VRA) and the Electricity Company of Ghana (EGG), have jointly placed an order for the supply of 400,000 energy saving bulbs at the cost of $1 million for sale to the public.
The first consignment of 150,000 will arrive in the country before the end of the month. Dr Charles Wereko-Brobby, the Chief Executive of the VRA disclosed this in an interview in Accra. Dr Wereko-Brobby announced that the VRA and ECG have formed a joint task force to kick-start the government initiative of introducing energy-saving devices in the consumption of electricity. He said the remaining 250,000 bulbs which have the added advantage of helping the beneficiaries reduce their bills by 75 per cent, will arrive by the first week of November.
The VRA boss said the task force will ensure that the sale will be on hire purchase basis and expressed the hope that if the government agrees to waive the duties and taxes on them, the bulbs will sell cheaply. President John Agyekum Kufour announced at the commissioning of the Mallam Sub-Station of the VRA recently that the government would introduce a special programme for the supply of energy saving bulbs which are 75 per cent more efficient than the normal for those who live in “compound houses” to help cut down on their electricity consumption.
In a related development, the VRA has instituted measures to improve on the stability of power by ensuring sustainable and a high a level of maintenance culture. Accordingly, the authority has drawn up an extensive maintenance programme to ensure that all the VRA lines and substations remain in top gear”. Dr Charles Wereko-Brobby said within the next two weeks the authority has arranged with the Ghana Air Force to tour all the 4,000 km transmission lines and conduct checks on them to take the necessary measures to ensure that whatever repairs/maintenance works required are undertaken to facilitate uninterrupted power supply.
He said “Those are the things that we are not doing regularly or have not been able to do more often as we would have liked. What we used to do in the past was to tackle a section of the line and inspect them but this time round, we intend to do on regular annual basis every single kilometer of line”. He said the Air Force has indicated that two helicopters would be used in the programme. Dr Wereko-Brobby disclosed that the VRA also plans to replace all transformers, both at Akosombo and at the authority’s 39 sub stations where power is distributed. He said tenders have already gone out for potential suppliers, adding that “the idea is that for the next five years, we should restore all the transmission systems, (many of which are old) to take charge of new ones.”
