Ghana Gas will begin building a 290 km gas pipeline, with eight distribution centres, a politician has said.
Frank Annoh-Dompreh, MP for Nsawam Adoagyiri and the majority chief whip, said the state-owned company would build the link from Takoradi to Tema. It will run through the Western, Central, Eastern and Greater Accra regions.
The official said the company would build a mini gas plant in Nsawama. Construction will create new employment opportunities for locals, he continued.
Local media reported the politician as saying an engineering study was under way in order to ensure people with the right technical experience were recruited. The company expects to complete the study in four weeks, he said.
Ghana built a first phase of the Takoradi-Tema Interconnection Project (TTIP) in 2019. This transports gas from Ghana’s west, where the offshore fields are located, to power demand in Tema.
Tema does also have an LNG import facility. Given high prices for the feedstock, this has proved challenging and it does not seem to have ever offloaded a commercial cargo.
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Other gas plans are afoot in Ghana.
Last week, Barak Fund and Trilinc agreed to provide $425 million to Genser Energy Ghana. The cash will go to funding a 100 km pipeline to Kumasi, a 200 million cubic feet per day plant at Prestea and an NGL terminal in Takoradi.
Genser said the project would encourage fuel switching from diesel and heavy fuel oil (HFO) to domestically produced gas. The company intends to export NGLs.
It signed an offtake agreement with Trafigura covering NGLs from the Prestea plant. The trader also supplied $45mn for Genser’s existing mezzanine loans and $7.5mn for the Takoradi terminal.
Tullow Oil has tipped offshore gas developments, for local consumption, as an opportunity. The company has found 2 trillion cubic feet of gas at its offshore fields and it expects local demand to grow strongly.