Chief Executive Officer of Bui Power Authority, Samuel Kofi Ahiave Dzamesi, has disclosed his outfit's plans to tap hydropower from three rivers in the Western region.
According to him, the Ankobra, Pra and Tano rivers have been given to them by government to build more hydro plants on them.
Speaking on GhanaWeb TV's BizTech programme hosted by Ernestina Serwaa Asante, the Bui Power Authority CEO noted that it would be run-of-river dams and not reservoir dams like Akosombo and Bui.
Mr Dzamesi stated that the flow of the river gives it that kinetic energy to run the turbines.
"So if you want to build more solar, then you have to first look for baseload before you continue. Luckily, government has given us the three rivers in the weestern region, River Ankobra, River Pra, River Tano so that we can build more hydro plants on them. God is very good to us that we can have more rivers to get more hydro plants in order that we'll be able to build more solar plants," he told Ernestina Serwaa Asante on BizTech programme.
“… if you go the Western region, the land is so rich really with a lot of minerals and so the type of dams that want to put there are not reservoir dams that you see here. The dam we have here is a reservoir dam. That means, you block the river and then you create a reservoir at the back, and they use that water to generate power. So, Bui and Akosombo are reservoir dams but if you go to a place like Kpong, you'll see that there is no reservoir at the back of the Kpong dam, meaning that the dam is situated right within the river so that the flow of the river gives it that kinetic energy to run the turbines so that one we call it Run of the River dams," he added.
He indicated that, "So, those are the projects that we want to do in the western region so that we don't occupy land so much."
Meanwhile, Bui Power Authority has 50 megawatts of solar plants on land and 5 megawatts on water. According to the CEO, this makes them the leader in renewables in the West African sub-region.
