The Energy ministry says it is working assiduously in scaling up its renewable energy avenues as it continues to ensure that there is enough energy capacity to support commercial and domestic consumption.

The ministry maintains that it has consolidated strategic measures to ensure that the country does not revisit the era of erratic power supply, which interfered with business activities in the past.

These comments were made by Deputy Minister of Energy, Andrew Kofi Egyapa Mercer at the 2022 Africa Energy Conference Organized by the Business and Financial Times in Accra under the theme: Africa’s energy future, achieving an all-round competitiveness and sustainability to support the continent’s development ambitions.

“In the area of power, Ghana has sought to enhance its generation, transmission and distribution of electricity nationwide, ensuring that it never goes back to the grim days of frequent power cuts; an era which left many industries crippled.”

“With resources available to her, Ghana now has an installed capacity of 5367.17 MW with access rate of 87%. Ghana has also seen the present opportunity to scale up its contribution of renewable energy in its generation mix to 10% by 2030 and is working to achieve this.”

“Ghana has passed an amendment to its local content and local participation regulations to include channel partnerships and strategic alliances in the petroleum upstream sector; a novelty which is projected to enhance indigenous participation in upstream related activities.”

The Deputy Minister mentioned that the government has passed an amendment to local content participation to include competitive partners in the petroleum upstream sector.

In his welcome reflections, the Chief Executive Officer of Business and Financial Times, Dr. Godwin Acquaye pontificated some limitations of the Africa Energy sector and called on stakeholders to rally feasible ideas to achieve sustainable outcomes.

“African countries still suffer from huge deficits in energy generation and distribution, resulting in small businesses languishing for lack of power. Our agricultural fresh produce rot on the streets, because of lack of refrigeration. Children underperforming for lack of electricity. Lives are at risk in our hospitals for lack of electricity, as lifesaving hospital equipment and services lie unused because of lack of electricity”, He said.

“With these immense resources, Africa should accelerate investments in technology, innovations, policies and regulations to speed up a renewables revolution. Africa cannot power its homes or businesses with potential. Africa must utilize its huge renewable energy potential and combine this with conventional energy to light up and power Africa.”

“The B&FT will increase and strengthen its policy dialogue platforms and engagements on energy for Africa. This is why we are working with you, our partners in the sector today to unlock all of Africa’s potential, conventional and renewables, and develop energy mixes that will not only light up Africa but also power industries,” he added.