Ghana’s gas woes will soon be a thing of the past as the Ministry of Petroleum prepares to present to cabinet, a comprehensive Gas Master Plan aimed at addressing infrastructure challenges and gas delivery in the country.
The document which is yet to reach cabinet in a few weeks will also address institutional mandates for the gas sector agencies and provide a revised gas pricing policy that would reflect Ghana’s developmental priorities.
“Once the ministry secures cabinet approval, for the plan, the ministry will develop a Gas Act that will provide transparent regulatory framework for the industry”, Petroleum Minister, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah said at this year’s Ghana Gas Forum.
According to Mr. Buah, the Act is further intended to prioritize gas supply to power plants in both the Tema and Aboadze power enclave; a situation the energy minister believes will soon solve Ghana’s current energy crisis as more discoveries are made.
Currently, Ghana has no law that regulates the sector but is pursuing an agreed short term gas action plan that is solely targeted at supplying the commodity to thermal plants to resolve the country’s crippling energy crisis.
“In this regard, Cabinet has given approval for the interconnection of the Ghana Gas pipeline with the West African pipeline through a Reverse Flow Engineering”, he said.
He announced that a project implementation team is in place to oversee the execution of the project to meet the deadlines set by cabinet.
However, to ensure long term supply security, Mr. Buah stated that a dedicated gas pipeline from Takoradi to Tema is being envisaged by the ministry.
Current estimates of Ghana’s gas resources are about five trillion cubic feet, with outstanding upstream discoveries.
Gas supply to the Aboadze power enclave since its inception has reached 100mmscf per day, while the ENI Sankofa project is expected to produce 180mmscf from reserves of about 1.07TCF for gas with total investment above U$6billion.
In addition, the second FPSO which will deliver about 60,000 barrels of oil per day and about 60mmscfd of gas is scheduled to dock in Ghana’s territorial waters by close of year.
