With the laying of the foundation for the NASENI Solar Cells Production Plant in Gora, Nasarawa State, by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, last week, the country’s aspirations in solar energy production as indeed the manufacture and testing of ancillary equipment has not only received fresh impetus, its dream of diversifying its sources of power would appear to be firmly on course.

We are referring here to a project of three parts: a production and research plant, consisting of four main production sections – polysilicon section of 1,000 tons per annum; ingot section of 50MW per annum; wafers of 50MW per annum and, solar cells of 50MW per annum – cost $171.9 million; an electric power transformer production plant costing $123,990,000 and a high voltage testing laboratory costing $29,900,690.

In all, we are talking of an investment outlay totalling $325.8 million to boost power supply and to address some of those perceptible lacunas in the power supply matrix. Whereas China Africa Development (CAD) through the Bank of China is expected to provide 85 percent of the funds, the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) is expected to provide the counterpart fund of 15 percent.

The project could only have come as an affirmation of NASENI’s relevance as an intervention agency; a bold statement on the prodigious possibilities of such research institutions, provided the right conditions are availed them to do their jobs. Perhaps unlike some agencies known only for drawing from the public till even when they have nothing of value to offer, NASENI has certainly set itself apart among the class that appreciates what it means to create real and lasting value to the economy and not least to the citizens, from whom it derives its rationale. It deserves to be encouraged.

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