Mr. Denis O'Sullivan:

The first question related to LNG and its impact on power generation. Currently, Ireland does not have liquefied natural gas facilities and, therefore, it does not have an impact. I do not see an impact either in a post-Brexit scenario unless LNG facilities are constructed in Ireland. I am aware two private companies are certainly investigating the potential to develop LNG facilities in Ireland. Until those facilities are in place, LNG will not have an impact on power generation. As an aside, we have two interconnectors with the United Kingdom that operate in parallel. They have little or no capacity constraint and there is sufficient capacity in them to deliver 100% of Ireland's electricity requirements if that was the case. We came very close to that in summer 2018, with more than 90% of electricity being produced from gas. Other areas are supplied by gas, including heat and industry.

I agree with the previous speaker that from a gas perspective, I do not foresee any impact on pricing in a no-deal Brexit scenario. As I mentioned in my opening statement, we are reassured by shippers, network operators and through the work we have done with our counterparts with the United Kingdom. This relates to the mechanisms in place, the platform for booking capacity and the idea that how trading of gas operates will continue in the same way. The risk relates to a significant economic shock arising from Brexit. From a gas perspective, if that materialised it would not have an impact on pricing. We can go back to 2008, when we had a serious economic shock, and there was no significant impact on energy pricing in general, and there was certainly no impact on gas pricing.

Senator Paul Daly asked if we can meet demand and we can do so in a post-Brexit scenario for reasons similar to those I have outlined. The same mechanism operating today for gas will operate post Brexit and gas supplies will come into the country. The Kinsale gas field is at end of life and we expect it to stop producing next year. The volumes it is producing now are quite small. The Corrib gas field, as I mentioned earlier, is under 50% of our current supply and that will decline over the next ten to 15 years. At the end of that period, we will be fully reliant on the interconnectors to supply our requirements for gas unless there is a further indigenous source of gas put in place.

In my opening statement I touched on the work we are doing to mitigate a position where we would be 100% dependent on imported gas. That will happen through the development of alternatives, such as renewable gas and hydrogen through electrolysis, which is taking excess renewable electricity and converting it to hydrogen. We see a bright future in that but it will require the co-operation of several bodies to come together and make that happen, as was mentioned.

To respond to Senator O'Reilly's query on Virginia Transport, I am very familiar with it and we are working in partnership with it to provide compressed natural gas infrastructure. Virginia Transport is proposing to build a new station on which we are working with it. The certified renewable gas it bought from the UK was delivered through the gas network. This is a huge opportunity. We opened a large compressed natural gas station in Dublin Port last year and another will open on the M7 motorway in the coming weeks. Several others are in development. This is at an early stage but we will roll out the infrastructure.

Initially, these stations will operate on natural gas, which will give an immediate 20% reduction on emissions over the use of diesel in these vehicles. They do not have a range issue. Refuelling a compressed natural gas truck takes three to four minutes, which is the same time it takes to refuel a diesel truck. The real opportunity here is to transition from natural gas to renewable gas. We have not sought supports or subsidies for this. I believe supports are required for the haulage industry and the bus sector to cover the cost of transitioning fleets and should be introduced. The task force on low-emission vehicles is looking at introducing supports where companies have incurred costs in taking the initiative to move to lower emission vehicles or emission neutral vehicles whereby they would get the same incentives as exist for electric cars and so on.

Senator O'Reilly also asked about the carbon footprint of introducing these measures. The gas network has a low carbon footprint as it is, with 100% renewable gas. This year, for the first time, we introduced some renewable gas on the network and we hope to increase this. The climate action plan calls for targets and mechanisms to be put in place to facilitate it. Our goal is to have a carbon-neutral gas network by 2050. There is a pathway to it and we have already started on it. We have commenced the roll-out of compressed natural gas and the injection of renewable gas onto the network.

There are other technologies that are complementary to the electricity sector, such as carbon capture and storage. Recently, we signed a memorandum of understanding with Equinor in Norway to investigate jointly the potential of capturing carbon from power generation plants and storing that carbon. In other words, in its simplest terms, this means taking the energy out of the gas and putting the carbon back where the gas came from. This technology also facilitates the production of hydrogen, which we see coming to the fore probably towards the latter part of the next decade and into 2030 and being a significant contributor. Overall, our ambition is to become a carbon-neutral gas network by 2050.

With regard to security of supply, the interconnectors we have with the UK are extremely robust. They have been there since 1993 and we have not had a single outage on them - touch wood. The fact we completed a twinning of the last section of pipeline in Scotland last year gives two completely independent interconnectors with Scotland and puts us in a very robust position in terms of security of supply. Having that said, any new forms of gas coming on the network outside of those interconnectors will enhance security of supply and possibly bring more competition into the market, which is always welcome.

I do not think there is a security issue. We are very much interdependent with the UK, particularly with regard to Northern Ireland systems. Natural gas flows into Northern Ireland initially via our network in Scotland and then through the Scotland and Northern Ireland interconnector. Because it is a single pipe, the backup for this interconnector is the South-North pipeline from the Republic of Ireland to Northern Ireland. This means gas would be flowing from the Republic of Ireland into Northern Ireland. The mechanisms for all his are in place. I cannot comment on potential terrorist activities but from a practical point of view, the normal working of the gas network is what we will see in a post-Brexit scenario.