First microgrid on campus
After graduating and getting his first taste of industry, Asare applied in 2021 to join the newly created Ashesi–ETH Master in Mechatronic Engineering. Established to educate the next generation of African engineers, this programme is run by academic staff from Ghana and Switzerland, with key input from Swiss industry partners. Asare received a scholarship from the chocolate manufacturer Barry Callebaut, a company based in Zurich that sources most of its cocoa from Ghana.
It was while looking for a topic for his thesis in 2023 that Asare came across Lygeros’ Master’s project. At the time, Ashesi University was drawing up plans for a new building, along with an additional power supply. This would create the perfect living lab to put a microgrid through its paces in Ghana – far removed from the safety net of the Swiss national grid. “We wanted to find out how big the microgrid would need to be,” Asare explains, “and whether the investment would pay off.” Compared to Europe, interest rates on loans are significantly higher in Ghana, which increases the lifetime cost of the installation.
After a succession of online meetings, Lygeros finally made the trip to Ghana in 2024 to meet up with Asare in person and get a feel for the situation on the ground. “In the evenings, we’d pop to the next village for a drink and often end up sitting in the dark because the power had gone off,” says Lygeros. Back on Ashesi campus, diesel generators would spring to life and fill the gap. “But that’s very expensive in the long term,” explains Lygeros. “So microgrids also offer an attractive option for Africa from an economic perspective.”
Asare teamed up with a fellow student named Goodnews Iduku to analyse what equipment and capital expenditure it would take to boost the share of photovoltaic power on campus from 13 to 60 percent of total power supply. “It was amazing just how committed the two of them were,” Lygeros recalls. “We’d discuss quite complex problems, and often they came back to me with suggestions just a few days later. I wondered sometimes if the two of them ever slept!”
Their dedication paid off: when it came to designing the power supply for the new facility, the university administration drew on the work carried out by the two students. What’s more, Asare was asked to stay on as a research assistant for another ten months after finishing his studies. Alongside photovoltaic panels and batteries, the new system also features various sensors and smart meters to monitor the microgrid’s performance. “This data will generate important know-how for the creation of further microgrids in Africa,” Lygeros explains.
Asare’s doctoral project in Zurich has further intensified collaboration with his professor. “I’m sure the knowledge he gains here will be put to good use back in Ghana,” Lygeros notes. “And that’s his primary concern: whether what he learns at ETH can be applied to what’s happening in Ghana.” Asked about his future plans, Asare responds that he will go wherever his work has the biggest impact: “If I were to develop a new technology in Europe, it would probably only marginally improve people’s lives. But in Africa, there are lots of problems that my knowledge can help solve.”
The joint ETH–Ashesi Master’s programme enjoys the support of the following donors: Adrian Weiss, the Arthur Waser Foundation, Bärbel und Paul Geissbühler Stiftung, Georg und Bertha Schwyzer-Winiker Stiftung, the Green Leaves Education Foundation, the Louis Dreyfus Foundation and the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs.