95% of workforce that worked on floating solar plant locals, fishermen - Ahiataku-Togobo

Director of Renewable at Bui Power Authority (BPA), Wisdom Ahiataku-Togobo, has noted that majority of the workforce that worked on the floating solar panels were local engineers.

He stated categorically that the services of some experienced fishermen were engaged to help in the tightening of the bolt screwed to station the floating panels.

Speaking to Ernestina Serwaa Asante, host of BizTech on GhanaWeb TV, the Director of Renewables at BPA said, “Let me say that the majority of the technical team are engineers, are staff of Bui Power Authority. We also engage community members, mainly the fishermen who are experts in fishing and can do the swimming. They helped us in doing the tightening of the bolt and because they are good swimmers, we worked alongside.”

“Of course, we had one or two external consultants to assist us in the installation. But I will say close to 95% of the workforce 95 to 96% of the workforce. Were local people, trained by our local universities, University of Energy and Natural Resources, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. These are the staffs who were involved and of course, we have some technicians from our technical universities and technical institutions. They assisted us in getting this job done,” Wisdom Ahiataku-Togobo said on BizTech.

He stated that BPA is looking forward to scaling up the solar panels on water with 10 more bifacial panels.

"Our plan is that once we test this concept, and it works very well, we will end up scaling it up. We started with one megawatts, we'll scale it up to five megawatts. And now our next target is to add another 10 megawatts. We are doing it gradually and we are learning, picking lessons from it. So that will improve upon every stage, that will move on," he stated on BizTech on GhanaWeb TV.

These bifacial solar panels have a higher efficiency as they are capable of capturing sunlight on both sides.

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