The $40 million project known as the Debre Marine Works (DMW), constructed by state-owned Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Limited (BOST), is to ensure safe landing and delivery of petroleum products by barges when the level of the Volta Lake drops low making navigation upstream to Buipe impossible. The Project is expected to start operations in June 2011.

“The project costs $40 million and has been completed, we are doing some administrative works before operations start in June this year” an official at BOST disclosed to ghanabusinessnews.com in an interview.

The official said the location of project at Debre is very strategic since it closer to the Brong Ahafo Region adding “It is cheaper to transport and distribute petroleum products on sea than the normal oil tankers by land to other parts of the country.”

According to information gathered by ghanabusinessnews.com at the stands of BOST during the just-ended Second Ghana Policy Fair, the project includes a floating dock, a tap boat, pipelines, tanks and four transportation barges as well as other facilities which will be made known when the project is commissioned.

The distribution will be done through pipelines from one depot to another, the company says.

BOST also says on its website that plans are underway to build a 50km petroleum pipeline that will link the Buipe depot and the Debre Landing Jetty.

“Products received at Debre will then be pumped through the pipeline to Buipe and subsequently to Bolgatanga through the Buipe-Bolgatanga petroleum pipeline thus facilitating an all year round barge transportation on the Volta Lake”, it said.

In a related development, the company plans to construct a 160,000m3 petroleum terminal at Apowa, near Takoradi in the Western Region as part of the national petroleum storage and distribution network.

According to BOST, the terminal is also expected to be linked to an offshore Coal Bed Methane (CBM) to facilitate the import and re-export of petroleum products within the West African sub region.

With six distribution depots at Buipe, Bolgatanga, the Accra Plains and Kumasi, Akosombo and Savelugu, BOST has 34 storage tanks with a total capacity of 315,050 cubic metres, according to data on its website.