The Minister of Education, Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, has advised public tertiary institutions to adopt and implement utility efficient practices to ensure energy utilisation.
“Implementing utility-efficient practices on campuses has been shown to reduce both utility bills and maintenance cost. Exploring other alternative energy sources could also be a huge step in reducing costs,” she said.
Professor Opoku-Agyemang gave the advice when she addressed the opening session of a stakeholders dialogue on the effective usage and management of utilities in public educational institutions at the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA) last Wednesday.
The event brought together officials of the Ministry of Education, managers of the various public universities, rectors of the various polytechnics, student leaders and other stakeholders to look at strategies for sustainable consumption of utilities in educational institutions.
Utility expenses
Professor Opoku-Agyemang said for instance that between November 2011 and February 2013, the government expended over GHc25 million on 13 public tertiary institutions as payments for electricity bill alone.
“Between August 2013 and January 2014, GHc6,979, 978 was spent on 19 public tertiary institutions,” she added, stressing that the amounts represented a fraction of the full cost of utilities in the public educational institutions.
She charged all to act quickly towards innovative and responsible approaches in addressing high costs of utility consumption as educational institutions expanded their infrastructure.
Options
Contributing to a discussion, the Pro-Vice Chancellor, Academic and Student Affairs of the University of Ghana, Legon, Professor S. Kwame Offei said the options available included that government continued payment of utility bills for the universities or for the universities to pass on the cost of utility bills to students, which would result in the increase of fees.
He said other options were to restrict the use of electrical appliances and other electrical gadgets that consumed a lot of power on campus.
On water, Professor Offei suggested the building of more bore holes at all the halls and lecture theaters in public tertiary institutions. The Head, Energy Efficiency and Climate Change Division of the Energy Commission, Mr Kofi Agyarko, proposed the formation of energy ambassadors in the public tertiary institutions to help conserve electricity and reduce the payment of high tariffs.
Published schedule
The President of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), Mr Prosper Dzetse, urged the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to stick to its published load shedding schedule to enable students to organise themselves.
He commended the government of showing commitment to solving the electricity problem not only on campuses, but in the country and advised students to learn to conserve energy by using electricity wisely.
Mr Dzetse challenged engineering students to come out with innovative and alternative means of solving the current electricity problem confronting the country.
