First unit of 250 MW floating PV project comes online in Ghana

From pv magazine France

The Ghanaian government has inaugurated a 5 MW floating solar photovoltaic system on the reservoir of the Bui hydroelectric dam in Ghana.

The 5 MW pilot PV array is the first section of a floating PV project with a total capacity of 250 MW, which will be implemented in blocks of 50 MW.

The solar plant was connected to the transmission system of the 404 MW Bui hydropower dam, which was commissioned in 2013 by the Chinese company Sinohydro. The large floating PV project is being developed by the Bui Power Authority (BPA), a company created in 2007 to operate the dam.

In times of drought, the solar power plant should supplement the production of the dam, which depends on the Black Volta River. According to Afare Apeadu Donkor, chairman of the board of directors of the BPA, construction work on the second phase of the project “is progressing.” He did not give an exact time frame for its completion.

“This again shows my government’s commitment to deliver on the promise to diversify and increase the renewable energy component of our energy mix to 10% by 2030,” Ghanaian president Nana Akufo-Addo said at the inauguration ceremony of the 5 MW pilot phase.

Ghana is increasing efforts to raise the share of renewables in its electricity mix. Under its energy strategy, the nation wants 2.5 GW of renewable energy generation capacity – probably including hydroelectric – by 2030. Ghana had just 64 MW of solar capacity at the end of 2019, according to International Renewable Energy Agency statistics.