Parliament urged to pass the renewable energy bill

The Director of Engineering Services of the Volta River Authority (VRA), Mr Sam Appiah, has called for early passage of the renewable energy bill before Parliament to enable the country to develop the energy mix to meet the ever growing energy requirement of the Ghanaian economy.
He said the law was an indication of the seriousness of the country to develop the sector to give a sense of direction to encourage investors to put their money in the development of the sector.
Mr Appiah was speaking at a symposium organized by the VRA at Akosombo on Tuesday under the theme “Power Supply; what drives the choice’ as part of the VRA 50th anniversary celebration.
He said policies and laws at governmental level and at the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assembly levels should incorporate measures that would help build local participation and ownership of renewable energy projects and technologies in the country.
He said in line with the VRA policy to lead in the development of renewable energy resources, the Authority had acquired four sites, two in Upper East and the other two in Upper West Region for the production of 10 Mega Watts of energy from solar energy.
Mr Appiah said the construction work on the project which was expected to cost between 10 and 20 million dollars would start by the fourth quarter of the year and expected to be completed by the first quarter of 2012.
He said the VRA had also obtained approval for the development of wind farms in eight areas for the production of 100 mega watts of electricity.
Mr Appiah said four of the sites would be along the coast while the remaining four would be inland and the study for the selection of the site was expected to take one year.
He said VRA had received strong interest from some companies who were interested in becoming junior partners in the project.
Mr Appiah said in addition to that, VRA was also looking for senior partners who would own and operate the plants with a minimum seize of 50 mega watts in partnership with the VRA.
He said the goal of the VRA was initially to construct the 100 Mega Watt plant on two sites at an approximate cost of 200 million dollars.
In reaction to a questioner, Mr E. A. K. Kalitsi, former Chief Executive of the VRA, called for continuous study of the conditions at the VRA settlement areas and come out with appropriate ways of improving the conditions of the people settled there.
Professor Francis Allotey who chaired the function said the excellent management of the Akosombo and the Kpong dams was an indication that Ghana was ready for nuclear energy since in the management of the dams, Ghanaian engineers had demonstrated that they could maintain state facilities.
He called on Ghanaian scientists to move from engineering to scientific innovations to help develop the economy.
GNA