Samuel Kallon 
By: Amara Kargbo
The Electricity Distribution and Supply Authority (EDSA), an institution that develops modern and efficient national electricity distribution infrastructure to meet the national energy requirements for industrial, commercial, and domestic customers through upgrading and expansion of the existing network, has projected its sales revenue to increase over NLe750 million at the end of 2023.
This declaration was made at the ongoing budget presentation for the Fiscal Year 2024 Budget Policy hearing at Ministry of Finance, George Street in Freetown.
However, the institution has been making gains in revenue generation and was displayed in their performance review in 2022 and 2023 including the sales of electricity which increased from million in 2021 to million in 2022 which represents a growth of 35%. The total cost of buying power excluding OPEX and CAPEX rose significantly from NLe806.03million to NLe1,394billion. A growth of 72.93% surpassed the growth in sales revenue largely due to the high cost of buying power relative to selling it.
The Electricity Distribution and Supply Authority forward to increasing in electricity access rate from 16% in 2018 to 36% in 2023 due to an increase in generation and evacuation capacity in the region of 80MW-85MW due to sustaining CAPEX investment by EDSA and international donor which is in line with MTNDP (2019-2023) Sub-Cluster 13.1 and Sustainable Development Goals 7.1.
The rationale behind the successes mentioned above was as a result of the interconnection and commissioning of the TRANSCO CLSG 225 KV transmission line with Bumbuna (161kv), implementation of the Integrated Management System (IMS) in February 2023, and the near completion of the rehabilitation of Electricity House.
The management of EDSA depicted that the Operational Current Status of the Network is capable of evacuating at least 80MW at peak load in Freetown and further interventions by development partners would increase 33kv evacuation capacity and reliability of primaries/switching stations.
The institution has positioned itself to increase the generation and transmission of electricity by at least 50MW, zero tolerance on illegal connections and theft of EDSA materials, and improve on low voltage areas such as Jui, Baw Baw, Hastings Wharf, Temne Town, Mogagbae, and PanTap Water.
In responding to customers’ needs, EDSA plans to roll out at least 50,000 prepaid meters, connecting industries that are high-end users of electricity, improving on the response time to emergencies and faults resulting from technical and commercial operations, pursuing loss reduction in the region of 5%-10% through Public Private Partnership intervention.
As it was shown in the Budget Parameters and Assumptions, EDSA is poised to improve on the health and safety procedures, and modernization of the Information Technology infrastructure of EDSA and the electricity demand will continue to show an upward trajectory.
Given the underlying parameters and conservative assumptions, the 2024 Budget is aligned to support the government’s agenda of the ”Big Five” and in tandem with the MTNDP and SDG which are focused on two key drivers that fall within the purview of EDSA, namely increasing access of electricity (rehabilitation and expansion of the sub-transmission and distribution network) and technical efficiency (reducing system loss).
