20megawatt solar farm to boost power grid

A 20megawatt solar PV power generating plant, considered to be West Africa's largest, has been completed at Onyadze in the Gomoa East district of the Central Region, and is ready to feed into the national grid.

The Chinese investors of the over-US$20million project, BXC Company Limited, on Monday took the Power Minister Dr. Kwabena Donkor on a visit to the project site and updated him on the work’s progress.

Commissioning has begun, to the point where connection of solar power to the ECG system is being tested, Michael Yong -- Deputy MD of the company, told the minister.

"We have installed the following equipment on the site: 40,480 pieces of polycrystalline silicon panels, 20 step-up transformers, 20 inverter rooms attached to transformers, 33kv overhead lines attached to a 33kv switch room, and a nine kilometre 33kv overhead line to the ECG sub-station near the Winneba roundabout," Michael Yong said.

"We would like to say that this project was solely financed by us without any guarantee from the government of Ghana," he added.

After going round the solar farm, Dr. Donkor expressed joy at what had been achieved without the government of Ghana being asked to provide a guarantee, which other IPPs have been asking for.

The Power Minister holds the view that due to perceived political and other risks, the return on investment for investors in Africa tends to be high, and so they cannot further burden government with requests for consent and support agreements.

"The brilliant thing about this particular project is that it was done without a government guarantee -- a government consent and support agreement," the minister said.

To encourage investment in solar energy, the government of Ghana has gazetted a generous feed-in tariff of up to GHp40.21/kwh and a short lead time for construction.

This, government believes, should be enough motivation for the private sector to take up the challenge and help government achieve its goal of 10% penetration of renewables in the energy mix by 2020.

"This is a very good example of what the private sector, well-motivated, can do; and our aim is to see this replicated across the country," the minister said.