Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 11 December 2013

Committee on Transport and Communications: Select Sub-Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport

Rationale for Sanctioning Energy Price Increases: Discussion with Commission for Energy Regulation

2:40 pm

Mr. Dermot Nolan:

That would be fine. On the question of the Shannon LNG case, the judgment issued today, I will say two things about it. The first issue is that we took that decision, and probably given that it is in some sense still potentially sub judice in the context of the court, we believed that if we did not change the framework that existed, and we did so in accordance with European law, gas prices in the country would be significantly higher over the next ten, 20 or 30 years. There were various numbers but we were thinking of a potential transfer from the producer to the consumer of hundreds of millions of euro; therefore, gas prices would be hundreds of millions of euro higher over the period of time. I accept the points about the jobs and I have no problem saying that I would very much like to see the project go ahead.

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