Under the relentless sun of Ghana’s Upper West Region, the Lawra Solar Farm stretches across the horizon a sprawling sea of 160,000 glinting panels that hum with the promise of progress.
Since its launch in 2023, the 100-megawatt facility has powered 50,000 homes, a beacon of Ghana’s pledge to draw 10% of its energy from renewables by 2025. Site manager Yusif Ibrahim, his shirt dusted with red Saharan sand, marches proudly between rows of photovoltaic arrays. “This is the future,” he declares. “Clean energy, no emissions. What could be better?”
But just 10 kilometers away, in the village of Eremon, the future feels less luminous. Farmer Adisa Mahama kneels in her parched field, crumbling brittle maize stalks in her hands. “Before the solar panels, the rains came,” she mutters. “Now the sky forgets us.” Scientists dismiss her claim solar farms don’t alter weather patterns yet her bitterness echoes across northern Ghana, where renewable energy projects have ignited tensions between climate ambitions and ancestral land rights.
Ghana’s renewable energy push, fueled by $500 million in international loans, is caught in a paradox. While solar farms like Lawra slash carbon emissions and phase out polluting diesel generators, they’ve also displaced communities and fractured trust. A 2024 Human Rights Watch report accused the Lawra project, funded by the World Bank, of forcibly relocating 200 families without compensation. “They promised schools, clinics, jobs,” says Eremon’s chief, Naa Abeifaa Karim, seated beneath a baobab tree scarred by initials of disillusioned youth. “We got dust and empty words.”
The grievances are layered. Though the Lawra facility created 500 jobs during construction, only 12% went to locals. Technicians were flown in from South Africa, while men like Alhassan Mohammed, a village assemblyman, watched trucks haul materials past their unemployed sons. “They call this Ghana’s project,” Mohammed says, “but where is Ghana in it?”
Energy Minister Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh defends the trade-offs. “We’re building a sustainable grid for millions,” he insists, citing plans to expand solar capacity to 500 megawatts by 2030. Yet critics argue sustainability cannot ignore social justice. “Renewables are essential, but not at the cost of livelihoods,” says Akua Dansua, the HRW researcher behind the damning report. “These projects replicate colonial extraction foreign capital profiting while locals lose land.”
The clash extends beyond human tolls. Near Lake Volta, the Bui Power Authority’s plan to float solar panels on water a global trend to save land has sparked alarm. Ecologist Dr. Esi Awuah of the University of Ghana warns that shading the lake could devastate phytoplankton, the base of aquatic food chains. “We’re trading one crisis for another,” she says. “Biodiversity isn’t a footnote in the climate fight.”
Amid the strife, glimmers of hope emerge. In Tamale, 300 kilometers east of Lawra, startup SunWave trains women to install rooftop solar panels, bypassing grid limitations. Co-founder Fatima Iddrisu, a former engineer, hands a wrench to 24-year-old Aisha Musah, who now electrifies homes in her village. “Before, I carried water pots for money,” Musah says, securing a panel to a corrugated roof. “Now I light up my community.” SunWave’s work has empowered 300 households, proving decentralized energy can uplift without displacing.
But scalability remains a hurdle. Ghana’s government prioritizes mega-projects to attract foreign investment, leaving grassroots efforts underfunded. Iddrisu recounts years of rejected grant applications. “Officials say, ‘Focus on the cities,’” she says. “But cities aren’t where darkness kills ambition.”
Back in Eremon, the human cost of this imbalance festers. Young men linger at a roadside kiosk, sipping bitter herbal brews as they recount lost farmland. “My father’s grave is under those panels,” says 19-year-old Kwame Tanko, gesturing toward the distant solar farm. “No one asked us. No one cared.”
The Lawra Solar Farm’s managers deny wrongdoing, citing signed agreements with “community leaders.” But Tanko scoffs. “Those ‘leaders’ were paid to stay silent.” Meanwhile, the promised clinic remains a blueprint, the school a ghost of cinderblocks abandoned mid-construction.
For Ghana, the path forward demands nuance. Climate goals cannot eclipse equity; megawatts must not mute marginalized voices. As the sun dips below the solar panels, casting long shadows over Eremon’s withered fields, Adisa Mahama whispers a plea to the skies: “Let the rains come. Let our children eat.” Her words linger a reminder that true sustainability hinges on more than technology. It demands justice.
