Ms Marie Donnelly:

As one might expect, they were very specific and detailed questions. With regard to the plan, Deputy Ryan is absolutely right. The governance process is central to going forward with the clean energy package. We have learnt many messages from the earlier rounds of legislation and one such message was that if one does not have a joined-up approach to this problem one will end up negating some of the good achieved. This is because one will inadvertently carry out reverse actions. In order to get the maximum impact, one needs to take the holistic view, not just of what one is doing oneself, but also of what one's neighbours are doing. Firstly, this plan asks member states to look at their own systems. What is each state's own energy need and what is it likely to be? Does it have an excess or does it have a shortfall? This is in the context of the fact that there is approximately 32% excess capacity for electricity in mainland Europe today, although this is not of course valid for Ireland. The problem is that there are not enough interconnectors between the areas with an excess and the areas with a shortfall and this is one of the reasons for the Connecting Europe Facility and the programme for 15% of interconnectors for member states so that we can actually bring this together. That excess capacity means that, as mainland Europe goes forward with the electrification of heat and transport and if the interconnectors can be put in place, the electricity system as it is will be able to cope with the increased demand.

This is different from where we in Ireland are at. We are an island, and our growth is such that demand will increase. We have to deal with that. We in Ireland, then, are in a slightly different situation. This issue with this plan is that one not only looks at one's own situation. Italy, for example, should not only look at its own situation but rather should look at who it is interconnecting with. What is happening in France? What is happening in Austria? What is happening across the Adriatic Sea in Croatia? Do these countries have an excess or a shortfall? Can one trade or build a common model? The plan is about, not only what one does in one's own country, but also what one does with one's neighbours. Brexit will have something of an impact on us in this respect because, following the departure of the United Kingdom, we will become very much an island. That, then, is the first point, that one not only looks at one's own situation but look around instead.

Secondly, one should take a long-term rather than a short-term view. At the moment this view runs to 2030 but the real message is that we not just stop there, we must at least think about what happens beyond that. The year 2030 is only a milestone in a journey and one can decide if that milestone is going in this way or in that way. That is an element of it. It is a milestone that we need to think beyond so that we get a long-term perspective. The investments we are talking about here are long-term infrastructural investments. One does not invest in electricity systems for ten years, one does so for 50 years, so any investment we make now we make for the long term. The idea and the structure of the plan is that one looks at what is happening in one's own space, what is happening beside one, and what is happening in the dimension of time.

To give some good examples so far, the Dutch already have a draft and it is already in consultation. There are different models out there, of course. The French are already well advanced with their model, primarily because France is one of that states that has been pushing for this, and it will be written by central Government. Germany has two versions and has to sort out which one to use. There are, then, examples of countries that have made progress in this space. The template is already there. If the Department is busy or does not have the resources or whatever else, I would suggest that it just get a group of researchers, or a commercial company or whatever, to do a first draft and then take that draft apart. It is a matter of just getting somebody to put words on a page and then tear that apart as necessary. The Department cannot delay; it needs something and it needs to be able to react to it. The sooner the Department gets this, the better. If one could just use the template with what is currently available then I quite honestly believe that a first draft could be done in approximately six weeks. This first draft would of course have to be refined and developed, and then sent to Brussels where, no doubt, a number of comments will be made on it, not least of which would be that the ambition not might be sufficient. I say this because I am quite sure that the ambition for renewable energy coming out of Ireland will not be sufficient. The target for Europe is 32% and the expectation in Europe is that Ireland will come forward with that target. It would surprise me greatly, however, if the Irish draft has a target as ambitious as that.

This takes me to Deputy Ryan's second question on fines. The renewable energy situation, for example, concerns legislation that is on the books and Ireland was part of the process for adopting it. This is normal legislation. The European Union operates on the basis of rules.

What marks the European Union out as different from other regions in the world is we have a common rule book, common legislation and we enforce the legislation. For example, if we had, which we possibly have, rules on how to build a chair, because we have a Single Market and the chair is built in Germany, it has to be able to be sold in Italy. If for whatever reason Ireland decided to make chairs with five legs instead of four and then could not sell them, there is legislation on this breach of the rules, there is recourse to the Court of Justice in Luxembourg, it will rule, and Ireland will have to conform with the rules because the rules are there for the Single Market. In the case of renewable energy, it is the rule and the law. Ireland will be breaking the law. We will be referred to the Court of Justice in Luxembourg which will ask first to be shown how we have broken the law, which in this instance will not be very difficult.

The second stage is that when a person breaks a Community rule, he or she is required to fix it, and if that person does not do so, he or she is fined every day until that person fixes it. This happens in all of the areas, not only in energy. That is why we would be fined. The law states we must achieve 16% renewable energy. We will not get there and we are clearly in breach of it. We will be fined until we get there, which might take two or three years. That means it is not just a once-off fine. It is every day until we get there.

The question arises of how the level of fine is assessed. Generally speaking, the court will use a market levelling mechanism. It will ask what it would have cost to comply with the legislation, and that is what the fine will be. That is how we get the figures of roughly €200 million per percentage point because, roughly speaking, one should have been able to achieve a percentage point with €200 million. I cannot say definitively that will be the number, but that is the mechanism that will be followed.

We will not be able to excuse ourselves. We will not be able to play the poor mouth. Ireland is the second richest country per capitain Europe, after Luxembourg. We have the highest and fastest GDP growth rate in Europe. We have all the natural resources in the world to achieve this. Why would somebody in Cyprus or the Czech Republic give Ireland a soft ride? These countries are much poorer than we are and these countries will make their target. Why should we get an easy ride? Politically, I do not see it happening.

There is an express provision in the governance regulation to provide for fines. That was put in there very deliberately because Europe has to be serious on this issue. If we are not serious, we are wasting all of our time. I think we will be facing fines.

On offshore floating turbines, I agree 100% that it is the emerging technology. Again, it is the five countries I was telling the committee about. I had the pleasure of going to see the offshore floating turbine off Porto. It is very impressive. It works. It works in storm conditions, even in hurricane conditions. It is fantastic. I think we can definitely do it. There are two issues we need to look at. If we are to do it off the west coast of Ireland, we will have to bring that power either across the country or around the country to get it to Europe, and we must think about which of the options we will take. The Celtic interconnector, with 700 MW, is a start. We will need more than that. At one stage, Iceland was talking about building an interconnector to the UK because Iceland has lots of power. That would be 2,000 km in length and nobody seems to be surprised at the notion. For us to build an interconnector to France, it would be nothing like that length. It would be much shorter. We could even build an interconnector to Spain. It is not only that we would sell our power to them, which is obviously an opportunity, but also that, more important, we would be able to exchange power. That is where the real benefit comes. The reason electricity costs less in Denmark than it costs in Ireland is because Denmark exchanges power in Nord Pool, which includes the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden and even Norway, so that Denmark can balance its system. We must pay all of the balancing costs ourselves because we do not exchange with anybody else. The interconnector is not only a mechanism to sell, but also to buy, which reduces our costs. As a philosophy for the future, that is the big thinking that we need to have in our heads.

Who knows what Brexit will be? My personal hope would be, regardless of what happens, that we still have a connection with the United Kingdom, and indeed Northern Ireland, in the electricity space. It must be remembered that we have a single electricity market on the island of Ireland. It would be most unfortunate if that were to be broken up. We need them and they need us. There are mechanisms for co-operation that can be put in place, regardless of what kind of withdrawal agreement gets put into place. It would be my personal hope that it is possible to have the same standards on both sides and we should maintain the connection and dialogue. We have to wait and see how things happen.

On the Flanders co-operative, I know why we do not have energy co-operatives. One of the limitations, if one looks at the Flanders co-operative in raising co-operatives in Europe, is that a large share of the 1 million people who are party to a community co-operative are operating with PV technology. The reason I put so much emphasis on PV technology is it is simple. It is like a light bulb. One plugs it in and goes away. It is an easy technology. No expertise is necessary other than setting it up. It allows people to participate in the process in a simple way. It is also an urban opportunity as well as a rural one. If we were to open, as it were, solar energy in this country, especially on a small scale, we would find co-operatives starting to emerge because it becomes a logical consequence of that as an entity. That is an area where policy can make a seriously big difference.