Akosombo fire - A wake-up call for nation’s power grid

Recently, Ghana dodged a national blackout.

The fire that ripped through the Akosombo Substation could have plunged large parts of the country into darkness for days, even weeks.

Thankfully, engineers at the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) acted fast and restored supply. 

But the report presented yesterday by the seven-member investigative committee to Energy and Green Transition Minister Dr John Jinapor should leave no Ghanaian comfortable.

The cause was not sabotage, not vandalism, not a sudden act of God; it was insulation failure.(See pages 16 & 49 for story).

In plain terms: old, brittle cables that should have been replaced years ago caught fire.

That is not just a technical fault; it is a policy failure.

According to the Chairman of the committee, William Amuna, the inferno began in the changeover section of the low-voltage panel.

Cables installed decades ago had deteriorated.

Their insulation became brittle, current leaked, and heat built up.

Mr Amuna was emphatic: “No deliberate human interference.”

This was not a case of someone “twisting something”.

It was decay. It was neglect. It was the predictable result of a maintenance culture that waits for disaster before acting.

This is not the first time ageing infrastructure has threatened our power supply.

But Akosombo is not just any substation.

It is a backbone of the national grid.

A fire there is like a blockage in the aorta. 

The fact that cables “installed decades ago” were still carrying critical load in 2026 is unacceptable.

Infrastructure ages. Insulation does not last forever.

Engineers around the world know this.

That is why there are replacement schedules, thermal scans, and preventive maintenance budgets.

The committee’s recommendation for a state-of-the-art control room, modelled on the Pokuase Substation, and a new permanent control building within 18 to 24 months is welcome.

But it must not become another report that gathers dust.

Dr Jinapor’s assurance that government will “implement the report to the letter” must be matched by budget lines, timelines, and accountability.

Engineers did a heroic job restoring power.

Heroism should not be our grid’s operating plan.

Maintenance is not optional; it is national security.

The cheapest time to replace a cable is before it catches fire. Preventive maintenance costs money, but it costs far less than the economic losses from outages, damaged equipment, and emergency repairs. 

GRIDCo and ECG must move from reactive “fix-after-failure” to predictive maintenance using thermal imaging, partial-discharge testing, and asset management systems.

Every substation, not just Akosombo, needs an age audit of cables and switchgear.

The Pokuase model should be replicated fast. But buildings alone are not enough.

We must invest in training, retention, and welfare of engineers and technicians.

They are the first line of defence.

Dr Jinapor described the incident as a “lesson” and a “wake-up call”. He is right.

But Ghana has been hit by too many wake-up calls that we snoozed. Dumsor taught us about generation capacity.

Now Akosombo is teaching us about transmission and distribution resilience.

If we ignore this lesson, the next fire may not be contained so quickly.

The Daily Graphic believes that the government must do three things immediately.

First, fund and fast-track the committee’s recommendations.

The 18-24 months’ timeline for a new control building must be a deadline, not an aspiration.

Second, launch a 12-month nationwide substation audit.

Identify and replace all cables and equipment passed their design life.

Publish the audit so the public can hold GRIDCo and ECG accountable.

Third, strengthen the regulatory framework.

The Energy Commission must have teeth to enforce maintenance standards and penalise neglect, even when the culprit is a state institution.

A resilient energy sector is not a luxury. It underpins hospitals, factories, schools and homes.

Investors do not commit billions to countries where the grid can burn down because of old cables.

Citizens cannot build lives around unpredictable power.

As Ghana pushes its green transition agenda, the irony is stark: our transition to new energy sources will fail if our old transmission infrastructure cannot carry the load.

The Akosombo fire had no human hand behind it, but it had human fingerprints all over it.

The fingerprints of deferred maintenance, underfunding, and complacency.

We must wash those fingerprints off the grid.

Let this report be the last time we discover decades-old cables only after they have burnt.

Let the new control building at Akosombo be a symbol not just of recovery, but of a new culture: one where we maintain before we mourn, prevent before we repair, and invest before we improvise.

Ghana’s lights must stay on. Not by luck, but by design.