Public institutions in Ghana will soon start using solar power, Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has said.

Dr Bawumia said cabinet has given the go-ahead for all public institutions to move from the national grid to solar power. 

This move is aimed at reducing the overburden debt of government on the Electricity Company of Ghana.

Speaking at the 4th Ghana Renewable Energy Fair in Accra, he noted that feasibility studies is underway for the commencement of the project.

“The government has always found itself in a situation where it spends so much power but struggles to pay for ECG to run,” he said.

As of 2016, the government’s total debt owed the ECG amounted to GH₵728 million forcing the country to issue a 7 to 10-year ESLA bond to service the energy sector debt.

Despite this intervention, it appears, the government remains the biggest debtor to the Electricity Company of Ghana.

The new move by the government to migrate all public institutions unto solar power is therefore to reduce the burden on ECG.

It is not yet known how much the whole project is going to cost the state or even the timeline for the start of the project.

The project when implemented would see the installation of solar panels at all states institutions across the country.

Dr Bawumia is optimistic that the move will reduce the cost of operations on the ECG.

“The programme will be cost effective as compared with government’s expenditure on producing grid for the generational mix.

The state will no longer become a burden on the power distributor because we provide our own power from the natural resources, in this case, the sun and make use of it without any bill payment” he noted.

The theme for this year's Renewable Energy Conference and Fair is Renewable Energy: exploiting energy resources at the district level.