Site Ranking and Potential Assessment for Concentrating Solar Power in West Africa

Emmanuel Wendsongre Ramdé, Yao Azoumah, Abeeku Brew-Hammond, Anselme Rungundu, Gildas Tapsoba

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.
Solar Energy and Energy Savings Laboratory, International Institute for Water and Environmental Engineering, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.
Solar Energy and Energy Savings Laboratory, International Institute for Water and Environmental Engineering, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso; Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.

DOI: 10.4236/nr.2013.41A019                

Abstract

Access to electricity is poor in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) presents better opportunities for increasing access to electricity and for diversifying sources of energy in the ECOWAS region; however, to date, except for Burkina Faso, no site evaluation pertaining to the region has ever been performed for CSP. This study provides potential assessment and site ranking for large-scale CSP projects in the ECOWAS region. It computes the nominal potential power and gives the corresponding energy yield with many scenarios. By considering only 1% of the suitable land area with daily DNI greater or equal to 5 kWh/m², a land slope less or equal to 5% and distance to transmission line not more than 100 km, the study showed, for example, that West Africa has a potential nominal capacity of 21.3 GW for parabolic trough technology.

Keywords

Concentrating Solar Power; Potential; West Africa

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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