Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

-----that on some matters we have a mutual interest, but there you are.

Post-2020, it is hard to say. I do not see any definitive decisions until there is a new Commission in place. Look at yesterday's report from the United Nations on climate change. It is inevitable that renewables will continue to be an important aspect of the energy mix, but as regards clarity and definitive policy in the remaining few months of the lifetime of this Commission - there is one more meeting of Energy Council Ministers - I do not think it will happen in the lifetime of this Commission.

On the export projects, the only project contemplated is the midlands one. That may well have involved a number of partners and as I stated on several occasions, I could not see how it could be delivered also within the timeline without the main landowner in the area being involved where there are unencumbered tens of thousands of cutaway bog, a commercial State company looking for a new mission, etc. That was the project envisaged.

My intention is that I would continue the work that we have done - the first phase of consultation was out - and that I would continue to try to develop the national planning framework because, whatever happens on the three months' deadline or on the IGA, the wind will not go away, trade between this country and the neighbouring country will not go away, and we should continue the work in that area.

As regards what lesson Deputy Cowen thinks that I might have learned from an MOU, the MOU is a statement of aspiration leading to an agreement. The MOU with the troika was a binding bailout agreement for all of the reasons of which he will be aware. Deputy Cowen is the one who raised it and if he wants to bat it back and forward, I will bat it back and forward with him, but it is not analogous to the attempt to come to an agreement between two countries about trading green energy. We will see what the outcome will be, but I can assure Deputy Cowen that the process, whatever the outcome, will be completed in advance of the three months.