SUSTAINABLE ENERGY
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With a population growth rate of 2.3% per annum, the supply and distribution of drinking water and electricity has become a primary objective for the Ghanaian government. One option identified by the Government to make available, at affordable prices, a greater amount of electricity is to focus on renewable energy.
The Government of Ghana, in fact, is committed to develop and elaborate policies and strategies for the development of renewable resources, such as biomass, solar (photovoltaic plants both stand-alone and grid connected) geothermal, hydroelectric and wind. In 2011 the RENEWABLE ENERGY ACT was adopted and in 2015 with the "Renewable Energy Programme Investment Plan" investments of 230 million dollars were announced.
In addition to these interventions, in 2017, President Akufa-Addo announced that he would extend the "Renewable Energy Programme" Increasing investment and adopting a subsidised tariff scheme to encourage investors to take quality initiatives as private energy producers. The Government has declared that by 2020, 10% of the energy produced will have to come from renewable sources complementary to the hydroelectric supply. So: photovoltaic, wind, biomass and waste, with the desired involvement of capital (and technologies) from abroad. Currently only one 2 MW photovoltaic plant is operating in Punga, in the northeast of the country, managed by Volta River Authority. Radiation levels are quite favourable: ranging from 1,800 to 3,000 days a year. The use of photovoltaics should serve above all to cover locations isolated from the national grid. These are the so-called "off grid" systems for which substantial contributions are also provided by the African Development Bank.In the wind energy sector there are some projects located along the coast of a Swiss and a Danish group.
In the hydroelectric sector, the Ministry of Energy has identified 16 sites suitable for supplying small and medium-sized power plants ranging from a minimum of 17MW to a maximum of 95MW. Ghana has good potential for the production of energy from biomass linked to different agricultural productions (oil palm, sugar cane, cocoa) but at the moment there are no major projects in this sector. Another area of intervention concerns the introduction of sustainable and efficient wood fuels to replace the traditional use of wood and charcoal for domestic uses (cooking, domestic hot water etc.) which have a preponderant share (60%) in the overall energy balance of the country. Finally, the programme provides for the development of the biofuels sector to cover a large part of the uses for transport and for the production of static energy (feeding pumps for agricultural irrigation and others).