Ghana's gas project to complete in 2014

The deadline for the completion of Ghana's gas infrastructure project in the western region has been extended to first quarter of 2014, the Ghana Gas Company (GGG) has said.

The company's chief executive officer George Sipa Yankey revealed it as a delegation from Tullow Ghana Limited and the Volta River Authority visited the project site Thursday to acquaint them with the progress of work.

Stating the reason behind the delay, he said, the contractors on the project had failed to meet the completion target in December as a result of initial financial constraints and loss of some construction materials in turbulent sea waves in South Africa.

The project, Yankey said, was 72 percent complete and that both onshore and offshore pipelines had been laid while two liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) tanks were close to completion.

Two additional LPG storage tanks, he said, would be constructed to augment the total capacity to 8,000 cubic metres to supplement domestic consumption.

He said the GGC had assembled competent companies in the petroleum industry across the world to support Sinopec of China to complete the project by the first quarter of next year.

He also said that the gas infrastructure project was very crucial to the development aspirations of the country. The gas processing plant is expected to receive 140 million standard cubic feet of raw gas per day from the Jubilee Oilfield when it comes on stream.

The West African country, which started drilling crude oil in the last quarter of 2010, intends to utilise the raw gas from the oil to generate electricity to boost the country's energy production.