We resized the system, replaced the battery and inverter. Now we take care of the maintenance and upkeep.

The Children’s Village project is an initiative of the LoszuGhana NGO to support women, orphans, needy and less privileged children.

There were already two solar installations on the roofs of the Children’s Village of Loszu Ghana in Kumasi. However, in both installations, the batteries have reached the end of their life. The PV-modules were still in good condition – only the cabling was wired according to the „African pattern“; without plugs, cables only twisted and not twisted correctly, so that the power of the modules could not be used efficiently. The inverters used were oversized and the capacity of the batteries was much too small. All these circumstances led to a daily deep discharge of the batteries and thus to a very short lifetime. As soon as the sun was gone, the village had no more electricity. and for the operation of the water pump and the refrigerator the power was missing. To fill the water tanks, a gasoline generator had to be used, which is cumbersome and required a lot of expensive fuel. This had been going on for over a year.

The heat of the day piled up in the rooms without fans, making it impossible to sleep through the night. Especially the youngest ones suffered from rashes on their skin in this heat, for example. Dangerous animals such as spiders, snakes or scorpions were hardly visible without light and posed a danger when walking around at night. Fresh food did not last long without a refrigerator, and the almost daily trip to the nearest market took a lot of time and fuel.

Prince Opoku, our local solar installer plugged in the PV panels and rewired them with UV-resistant solar cable. The two separate grids were merged, requiring only a battery and a stand-alone inverter. The existing PV modules on the roof of the kitchen were fitted with micro-inverters and connected to the island grid (AC coupling). The modules on the training building were connected with a new MPPT Charger (DC coupling). Thanks to a new battery with 15 kWh capacity and a new high-efficiency inverter, there is now enough power and energy available so that the water pump and the freezer can be fully used again.

A stable energy supply awakens old desires; People have always wanted outdoor lighting to illuminate the campus at night to protect against burglars and wild animals. The lights were installed once before during the PV system remodel. However, they were not included in the budget and not considered in the design, which means that now, on days with little sunshine, the PV output of the system is reaching its limits.

We would now like to install two more PV modules and an automatic load disconnection at low battery level. For this extension we need an additional budget of about 2’000 USD and are looking for sponsors again.