State-run Israeli company Israel Electric Corp (IEC) and SBI Intl Holdings of the Netherlands made the highest bids in a tender for a project set to expand transmission facilities at the Takoradi thermal plant in Ghana.

Ten foreign companies bid for the contract, aimed at reducing overloading and system losses and improving reliability, Gilbert Dokyi, chief executive of the Volta River Authority (VRA), operators of the thermal plant, told Reuters on Monday.

The two leading bids both came in at $17.7 million.

Dokyi said a new 140 km (85 mile) transmission line would carry electricity from Prestea, about 320 km (200 miles) northwest of the capital, Accra, to Obuasi in the Ashanti Region.

Both Prestea and Obuasi are important mining towns, whose activities would be enhanced once the line is completed.

Dokyi said the new transmission project had been packaged for possible funding from the International Development Association (IDA), the soft-loan arm of the World Bank.