Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) has seen a significant increase in energy production since the African Forum for Research and Education in Health (AFREhealth) installed a 30-kilowatt solar system at the organization's secretariat, which is housed within the school's School of Public Health.
The program intends to lessen the university's excessive reliance on the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG), which now incurs monthly electricity consumption charges of between GHC4.5 million and GHC5 million.
Vice-Chancellor of the University, Professor Rita Akosua Dickson, stated in a speech during the project's commissioning that she has ordered every college in the organization to set aside money for clean and sustainable energy solutions while also encouraging the use of renewable energy alternatives.
Professor Rita Akosua Dickson believes that AFREhealth's installation of the solar system will be essential to accomplishing this sustainability objective.
We cannot let SDG 7 slip our minds as the top science and technology institution in the nation when it comes to providing the greatest education possible. We value clean, green, and renewable energy greatly. What we are currently dealing with as a university in terms of the bill for the Electricity Company of Ghana alone is ridiculous. In reality, it is shooting through the roof. We pay between 4.5 and 5 million every month. That is completely unsustainable. As a university, we think that this is the direction we need to take. As a result, there are many solar lights scattered over the campus.
We instructed every college to create a budget for future clean and green energy sources last year, and we are still working on that. We praise God that this occurred today. For us, AFREhealth has paved the path. You are here, energy consultant, and you are aware of the design I have in mind for the parking lots. Thus you can see, being a scientific and technology university allows you to be highly creative and imaginative. So, we still park our cars while collecting sustainable energy. What a lovely approach to make use of the resources that nature has given us.
According to Dr. Richard Opoku, the university's energy consultant, they have established a goal for the institution to produce 20% of its energy demands from renewable sources by 2025.
"As a university, we have an energy strategy that states that by 2025, 20% of our energy needs, in particular, solar energy, should be met by renewable sources. Colleges at the university have created projects to install solar energy and other renewable energy sources as part of the energy policy. Less than 2% of the total energy mix is currently made up of renewable energy sources. So, we have aggressively begun to fight for the achievement of this 20% goal by 2025.
The Executive Director of AFREhealth, Georgina Yeboah, underlined the difficulties they encountered due to an unreliable power supply, notably during the outages experienced by the Electricity Corporation of Ghana.
In response, they started the solar system project, which resulted in installation costs of roughly $60,000 USD.
"AFREhealth is a Pan-African organization; we are present throughout Africa, and we have members from all over the continent. Hence, we engage in a lot of online and virtual activities. So, if you don't have electricity, just assume that you are going about your daily routines when all of a sudden, it shuts off. We (the secretariat) are the host at times, which has an impact on the overall activity. In light of this, the school agreed that we required a backup power supply when we brought it up with them. We discussed employing generators, looked at the associated costs, and finally decided to go with solar power.
The National Institutes of Health's Fogarty International Center in the USA provided funding for the investigation.
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