Volta River Authority To Sell Power To Mali

The Volta River Authority, VRA, has said plans are far advanced in selling power to other West African countries aside the already supplied countries namely Ivory Coast and Togo.

Speaking after the Africa Center for Integrity and Development Africa presented an award to him for his integrity in the energy sector, Chief Executive of the VRA, Ing. Emmanuel Antwi-Darkwa, said there is an opportunity for the VRA to generate enough income by selling power outside Ghana.

“In the year 2020, we are going to continue to be dominant in the supply of electricity in the sub-region. That will happen, but we are not going to limit ourselves to only Ghana because we have provided a solid foundation for economic growth.”

“We have made power available. There is a lot of power generation in Ghana. We want to look beyond Ghana and continue what we have been doing in the last fifty years or so, and continue to supply Togo and Benin, Burkina Faso,” he stated.

According to him, next year what VRA is going to do is to put in a lot more effort so that in the sub-region the plan to establish the West African Power Pool comes to fruition.

The West African Power Pool (WAPP) is a cooperation of the national electricity companies in Western Africa under the auspices of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

The members of WAPP are working for establishing a reliable power grid for the region and a common market for electricity. It was founded in 1999.

“One of the priority projects is to connect the transmission line from Bolgatanga right to Mali. Once that is done, then we will supply power to Mali, and once we get there, it means we are in Senegal. Once we are in Senegal, it means we are in Guinea,” he noted.