Amid the twinkling lights and heightened commercial activity of the Christmas season, the Minister for Energy and Green Transition, Dr. John Abdulai Jinapor, has issued a firm guarantee that the national power grid will remain stable, despite surging to a historic all-time high in energy consumption.

The minister’s assurance comes as the Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) officially recorded a peak generation demand of approximately 4,300 megawatts (MW), a record-breaking figure that underscores the growing pressure on the nation’s energy infrastructure.

‘The Lights Will Stay On’: A Festive Commitment

Addressing participants at a ministry-organised health walk on Saturday, December 20, 2025, held under the theme “Recharge, Refocus and Reconnect”, Dr. Jinapor acknowledged the technical strain the current demand places on the system.

“We are seeing a huge increase in terms of energy consumption. And that also presents a challenge. It means that we have to work very hard to sustain the lights and keep the lights on,” Dr. Jinapor stated.

Despite the daunting 4,300 MW peak, the minister was quick to quell fears of a return to power instability (dumsor), insisting that the sector’s agencies are now more resilient than ever.

“Let me assure the people of Ghana that those of us in the ministry will continue to work very hard; it is very challenging, but so far we are holding on, we are making significant improvements, and we will continue to work to deliver on our mandate,” he stressed.

The Three-Pronged Strategy: Petroleum, Renewables, and Law

To move beyond mere emergency management, the minister outlined a long-term re-engineering plan for the sector.

This involves:

1. Petroleum Strengthening: Ramping up domestic production to fuel thermal plants.
2. Renewable Shift: Aggressive rollout of solar and wind projects to diversify the energy mix.
3. Contractual Integrity: Ensuring every dollar spent is value for money.

Dr. Jinapor made a specific appeal to the legal professionals within the ministry and its agencies—such as the Volta River Authority (VRA) and Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG)—to be the frontline defenders of the nation's purse.

“And so I want to call on you, the lawyers in particular. You would always review all our contracts and ensure that the negotiations go very, very well, and so I want to encourage you to give your best and to work very hard.”

Networking for Resilience

The health walk served as a rare moment of respite for workers in a sector that rarely sleeps. Praising the initiative, Dr. Jinapor proposed that the walk become a quarterly, sector-wide event to foster better networking and physical well-being among energy workers.

He argued that a "recharged" workforce is better equipped to handle the high-pressure environment of managing a national grid during peak seasons.

As Ghana enters the final stretch of the 2025 festive season, the Ministry of Energy has deployed technical teams to monitor "hotspots" where local transformer overloads might occur due to high residential demand.