Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Keating for the excellent presentation. This is a significant export opportunity, as he rightly outlined, and it is pan-European infrastructure we are building. I have a few basic questions. Who are our competitors in respect of delivering Europe's needs in this sphere? How should the cost be shared for the development of a pan-European infrastructural project of this nature? It sounds as though Ireland has some responsibilities, perhaps in priming the pump, if I can use that phrase, and in having a grid option that will facilitate this. Should it fall on the State to deliver the construction of the significant necessary infrastructure we are talking about or should it fall on private investors, which no doubt have the capacity to build and contemplate the running of these technologies, to do so? Should there be a European-wide strategy similar to the TEN-T European-wide networks, as Mr. Keating mentioned earlier, where Europe plays a part?

If we go beyond what is a domestic need, whereby the gigawatt projection to 2030 is based on what we can provide into our own grid or through interconnectors for onward selling, will that become a significant cost on the State? Have our guests estimated the pump-priming cost faced by the State in the different elements of the strategy they are talking about?