Going Solar Will Cut 30% Of Telecos Opex

Over the last decade there has been phenomenal growth in cellular subscriptions across the world. It is estimated that by the end of 2015, there will be more mobile devices in use than people on Earth. The Ghanaian telecom sector alone has seen a marginal increase of 0.41%, from February 2015�s figure of 31,028,253 to 31,154,420 at the end March 2015. In order to satisfy this mounting demand for good uninterrupted connectivity, the network of telecom towers has to increase to diffuse the regions of the country. However, as most of the telecom towers sited in the cities and urban areas are not immune to the current dumsor-dumsor, same can be said of those in the rural and other remote regions (mountaintops, forests and jungles, deserts) where the grid is absent. Consequently, telecom companies have counted on diesel generators as a source of power, but diesel generators run at a lower efficiency level and have become more costly to operate, and produce high CO2 emissions. Solar Powered Hybrid electrical system is an efficient solution to Diesel Generators as it can reduce operating costs of Diesel Generators and provide an uninterrupted power supply throughout the life of a project. Let�s examine the economic and environmental impact of using solar PV -hybrid system instead of diesel generators, considering both running and fixed costs. A PV -hybrid system with a capacity of around 8-10 KW peak power in three different tower locations (names withheld) in Kumasi, where diesel generators is a main source of Power.