Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank our guests for attending and for their presentations. I will try to avoid duplication so I will leave aside points I was to make around community ownership and smart meters, which have been covered extensively in the presentation.

In the area of microgeneration, the Citizens' Assembly recommended the selling back into the grid of electricity from microgeneration by private citizens at a price at least equivalent to the wholesale price. Incoming European Union legislation in the form of the recast EU renewable energy directive will usher in some of these elements to generate, store and sell renewable electricity for consumers in Ireland. What are the challenges to microgeneration, storage, self-consumption and exporting to the grid? How can we overcome these challenges and will we do so? How far are we from getting a tariff for selling electricity back to the grid? Many farmers are seeking to produce and sell renewable energy as part of their business models by using, for example, rooftop spaces for solar power or other methods. When will they be able to produce and export to the grid?