The sod has been cut for the construction of Ghana’s First Bitumen Processing Plant in Tema. The plant is estimated to cost about 35 million dollars.
It is said to be one of West Africa’s biggest bitumen plants and expected to deliver quality bitumen for road construction in the Sub-region. The Project is a partnership between Goil Ghana Limited and its Ivorian counterpart, Societe Multinational de Bitumes.
The demand for bitumen-paved roads in Ghana keeps growing as the Ministry of Roads and Highways intend to rehabilitate and construct several kilometers of highways and urban roads with Polymer Modified Bitumen.
This has proven to give a longer span to asphalted roads due to its resistance to high temperature of about 80 to 90 degrees celsius before any deformity.
So far the PMB technology has been used on some major road projects such as the Tetteh Quarshie-Madina Highway, improvement on sections of the Amasaman-Tudu road network, parchments on the Tema Motorway and the Elubo-Agona Highway.
Recent Ghana Highway Authority figures indicate that Ghana requires about four thousand metric tonnes of bitumen for the next four years.
It is against this background that Goil, in partnership with Societe Multinationale de Bitumes, SMB, of Cote d’Ivoire is constructing the First ever bitumen plant in Ghana.
The establishment of the Plant is to meet the needed competition and ultimately lower the cost of bitumen and eventually takeover the supply chain which has been dominated by multinationals.
The Energy Minister John Peter Amewu, said government will support this innovative effort to improve the quality and durability of roads across the country.
Mr Amewu called on the Ghana Highways Authority to insist on the right specifications for bitumen to be used for road construction to improve Ghana’s road networks.
The Acting Group Chairman and Managing Director of Goil, Kwame Osei-Prempeh, said marketing of bitumen by the Company has come on the back of the high demand for the product. He said its production will widen the portfolio and consolidate gains made so far in the fuel market.
Mahamadou Doumbia, of the SMB, Cote D’Ivoire, said the partnership will foster greater unity and enhance peaceful business relations between the two countries.
The 35 million dollar Plant has a total capacity of eight thousand metric tonnes and is expected to be completed in two years.
