Atlas Business and Energy System (ABES) a private solar energy firm yesterday launched its solar panel to help ease the power shortage in the country. Mr. Nathaniel Gyibah, the Managing Director, said that its solar panel was built in Ghana and that the only components imported from their collaborators from Finland were the inventors, charge controllers and the batteries.

Mr. Gyibah said that the energy industry in Ghana is a major concern to many people, adding that the introduction of the solar panel will curb the power shortage that often causes inconveniences to the people of Ghana.

A special guest of honour, Dr. Charles Martinson, General Manager of the HFC Bank, said that the solar equipment will help eradicate poverty and thereby contribute to achieving the Millennium Development Goals.

He noted that the dependency on fossil fuel sources have resulted in the present climatic conditions with devastating effects on the global environment.

“It has therefore become imperative to seek and develop new, innovative and affordable energy sources to contain the effect of green house gases on the global economy,” he added.

The answer, he said, lay in renewable energy technologies which can bring about both environmental and socio-economic benefits as they generally entail fewer emissions.

Dr. Martinson regretted that renewable energy projects are often promoted by comparatively smaller entrepreneurs who lack credit worthiness for large long-term financing.

He urged the public to support the idea of renewable energy system.

In an interview with The Ghanaian Times, Mr. Emmanuel Ndzibah, a researcher from Finland, said that the solar energy comes as a back-up which is normally used when the light goes out whilst the hybrid is used when the light is on.