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

It is hard for the CRU or EirGrid to get down to the level of looking into what is in the file. I know, however, that we had a meeting, I think last week, where EirGrid discussed some of these issues and the example of having data centres which could possibly turn on or off in complement of renewable power. For example, over a large wide regional area, we might look to complement the use with where the renewable energy is abundant and available, and that is the sort of demand flexibility concerned. When it comes down to the issue, that is a separate issue in terms of which data are considerable valuable to collect. There is a real issue in that, but that is not for EirGrid or the CRU to manage and deliver.

The Senator made the point that, in this immediate price crisis, where gas is being used a weapon of war, we cannot ignore the fact that the climate crisis is also adding to the problems we have because, in truth, in an integrated European network system, which is what we are in, the rivers in Europe are running at historic lows at the same time as one-third of Pakistan is under water. I say that because those low water levels in European rivers mean it is not possible to move fuels up and down the River Rhine, that nuclear plants must switch off as they cannot get the cooling systems their secure supply needs, and hydro in Norway and elsewhere is not available because we have seen changing weather patterns affect the fundamentals of the energy system.