Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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In January the European Commission launched a public consultation on the reform of the European Union's electricity market design to better protect consumers from excessive price volatility, support their access to secure energy from clean sources, and make the market more resilient. It will involve making amendments to a number of current EU legislation Regulations and Directives.

The consultation closed in mid-February and the Commission published a suite of legislative proposals on 14th March. Ireland submitted a position paper on the 13th February which can be accessed at gov.ie ( www.gov.ie/en/publication/9d196-european-commission-public-consultation-on-reform-of-electricity-market-to-support-a-clean-and-affordable-energy-transition/). Ireland is currently engaging closely in European dialogue in relation to the proposals.

While Ireland is supportive of reform, we should not depart from the competitive principles of our market design, which would undermine the cost-effective decarbonisation of our energy system, jeopardize affordability and risk security of supply. Nevertheless, it is appropriate to look at the market design with a view to improving it particularly in context of increased renewables. Ireland will engage closely in this process working with European colleagues to strike the right balance in relation to investment opportunities to accommodate increasing renewable penetration, as well as flexibility signals for storage, demand side response and back up generation technologies.

It is critical that market design and energy market contracts operate so that consumers receive the full direct benefit of low-cost renewable energy sources such as solar and wind.

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The Climate Action Plan sets out Ireland's Solar Strategy to deliver a target of 8 GW of solar energy by 2030 and up to 5 GW by 2025 as one of the measures to meet the carbon budget programme for the electricity sector.

A range of measures are in place to support the accelerated roll out of solar energy including regular rounds of auctions under the Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS) to deliver grid scale solar energy to homes and businesses. There is currently over 500 MW of solar energy connected to the electricity grid and I expect significantly more to be energised by year end.

In February last year, I signed the Regulations that create an obligation on suppliers to offer the Clean Export Guarantee (CEG) tariff to new and existing micro generators so that they will receive payment for excess renewable electricity they export to the grid, reflective of the market value. This represented the first phase of a comprehensive enabling framework for micro-and small-scale generators in Ireland, including solar PV.

The Clean Export Premium (CEP) feed-in tariff, is a mechanism as part of the Government's Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS), designed to support non-domestic microgeneration installation sizes greater than 6kWp up to 50kWp. The Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) will consult on an implementation plan for the CEP tariff later in 2023.

My Department is also developing the Small-Scale Generation scheme for generators above 50kW to support the deployment of rooftop and community/local ground-mounted solar PV. This scheme is expected to be launched later in 2023.

In addition, the Department of Education provides funding for schools to install solar PV through the Summer Works Scheme and the Department of Agriculture provides grant support for qualifying farms through the Solar Capital Investment Scheme as part of the broader Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Scheme.