Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Well done to Mr. Blaney, the chairman of the board of regulators of the Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators, ACER. Also from Ireland are the CEO of Ofgem, the UK regulator, and the Permanent Secretary of the UK Department with responsibility. We have just sent over one of our best grid people to run the UK's grid for it. We are good at this, but we will no longer be good if we delay on solar. Now is the time to do it. While there is a risk to the industry and solar has to be built up, there is also a risk to the people in the industry who have been working on this for ten years and crying because every obstacle has been put in their way. It is time for that to stop.

As we stated in our submission, there should be a support price on export only. That encourages efficiencies and helps to fold the envelope and play our bit in a connected system that has to balance the grid locally. It needs to go beyond a grant or community scheme. Everyone needs to be involved because what Deputy Dooley said was true. Ultimately, what matters in this is politics, specifically public and political support for a transition. Technology is not the issue. We will learn and make mistakes, but we must have public support. We will get it when people feel like they are a part of it, understand it and benefit from it. This will not just unlock solar generation, but also EVs, heat pumps, efficiencies, retrofits and everything else. It will unlock the farming community, which has to be on the green side. It already is, and it is begging for some kind of support for putting tech on a barn.

I would be interested in the regulator's opinion regarding a support price on export only. It would not have a large effect, and certainly not in the next five years. If it suddenly became a runaway success with 3 GW, we could manage that, but it is time to support rooftop solar and community energy. We must do it now.