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

I agree fully. I have been talking to people who have been involved in this in Europe and it is starting to happen in the North Sea and elsewhere. They deal in 5 GW chunks. While what I have said might sound outlandishly brave, big or ambitious, it is not. This is the way it will be built. What I hear in Brussels and Europe is that they are dying for us to come into the game. They are waiting to fund this through the Connecting Europe facility. Andrew McDowell is here crying on a regular basis because he does not have counter-parties to lend to. He is dying to lend to this sort of project. If it started now, EirGrid would get it into the next ENTSO-E ten-year plan and obtain funding to connect its facility backed by the EIB. I know developers who would do it tomorrow and I can provide their phone numbers. Perhaps it would not quite be tomorrow, as this will take 15 to 20 years. However, if we do not start now, we will not get it in 15 or 20 years as we should. To come back to reality and much closer to home, I ask what is happening with the North-South interconnector.