Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Moving to electricity demand, demand reduction was brought up earlier by Senator Higgins, I think. We did not meet our targets. I think gas demand was a voluntary reduction of 15%, which we did not meet. I think it was actually 0.3%. In electricity demand reduction, we were the only country apart from Malta that went completely the wrong way. There was an overall 10% reduction figure and then a 5% binding peak demand figure. My concern is that according to Ember data, we did not meet those reductions and our electricity demand went up. When it was before this committee, EirGrid told us that 9% was a normal predicted demand growth in electricity. When challenged on that, it supplied us with figures, which I think stated that about 1% is the EU average. I point that out because it seems, for some reason, that the metric used to pitch our electricity demand reduction was not what is always used, which is the baseline of what you did 12 months previously. Instead, it was the predicted demand growth, which seems very fortuitous for Ireland given that we had a 9% predicted demand growth, which was completely out of kilter. It could possibly mean we will meet that demand reduction, but we are meeting it because we are using targets that are way off any other European country. Does the CRU have concerns about the 9% figure EirGrid supplied to the committee? Will Ireland reach our electricity demand reduction target?