Ahantaman Girls’ Senior High School has clinched the top spot in the Southern Zone of the 7th edition of the Energy Commission Renewable Energy Senior High School Challenge with an innovative, solar-powered fish-smoking system designed to eliminate cancer-causing compounds from smoked fish while cutting carbon emissions.
The award-winning project, dubbed the “Royal Smart Fish Smoker”, beat Presbyterian Boys’ Senior High School’s (PRESEC, Legon) “Poultry Grid” project.
The solar-powered fish-smoking system integrates renewable energy with automated smart technology to modernise traditional fish processing, aiming to produce cleaner, safer and export-quality fish.
Speaking to journalists in Kumasi after the victory, Project Lead Nana Aba Asankuma highlighted how the system tackles the critical health and environmental drawbacks of conventional fish-smoking techniques.
“With traditional fish smoking, there is a huge release of carbon dioxide and other gases, and carbon deposits settle on the fish,” Asankuma explained, stating, “These carbon deposits contain polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are likely to cause cancer in humans.”
Traditional fish-preservation methods across West Africa rely heavily on open-fire wood stoves, exposing both processors and consumers to toxic smoke and health risks.
To address this, the students engineered a system featuring a controlled smoke-generation chamber, an automated processing unit and a specialised power assembly supporting the main kiln.
“With our system design, we have a controlled generation chamber which produces controlled smoke and reduces the amount of carbon dioxide released,” Asankuma said, adding, “Fish smoked in our kiln has less carbon deposit settling on its surface, meaning there is a high probability of significantly lower PAH levels.”
By drastically reducing toxic residue and greenhouse gas emissions, the team hopes the Royal Smart Fish Smoker will help local fish processors meet the strict health and safety standards required for international export markets while safeguarding public health at home.
Presbyterian Boys’ Senior High School (PRESEC, Legon), which designed the “Poultry Grid”, took second place, followed by Kpando Senior High School with its “KPASEC 24-hour Mobile Plastic Recycling Machine”.
Organisers confirmed that all three qualifying schools, out of the nine contestants, will advance to the national grand finale scheduled for 17 November 2026 at the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA).
They will compete alongside three qualifiers from the upcoming Northern Zone competition to determine the national winner.
George Sappor, coordinator for the Energy Commission Renewable Energy Senior High School Challenge, said funding constraints pose the biggest threat to scaling youth-led clean-energy innovations, despite their immense potential to transform the national power sector.
Mr Sappor, who also serves as the Head of Public Affairs at the Energy Commission, stressed that expanding practical education in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) requires significant financial backing.
“The major challenge has got to do with funding, because it’s a huge project,” Mr Sappor said, adding, “You’re getting senior high schools to compete on one stage to find renewable energy solutions. They have to raise money to build prototypes and conduct research. One of the schools here talked about spending about GHS35,000 to develop their prototype.”
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