Mr. Jim Gannon:

Without wishing to challenge that, the question must also be, "What are we going to regulate?" At present, we regulate the network companies to ensure connections are put in place and cost efficiencies are brought about. We regulate the supply companies. We also have a legal mandate with respect to security of supply. These are facets of what we regulate.

If the Deputy is asking if the CRU would develop and maintain a register which could only follow data that others already have in their hands, the EPA, where there is a licence in place, would get all of the reporting around environmental emissions, water, etc. I am not sure what is being asked to regulate the development of data centres because that rests more with economic policy and questions around enterprise. These include what the net benefit of data centres is to the Irish economy; what the right level would be for data centres to reach as a segment of our economy; how would we encourage them to reach that level, if we are not already there; and what behaviours should we incentivise. Those discussions should be had very early and effect a Government policy document, such as the one in place. With that Government policy document or policy statement in place, it should be down to the CRU to say how it will execute the part it is to play in this area, that it will interact with the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications in advance of the Climate Action Plan 2023, that it needs a demand strategy, that it will focus more on larger energy consumers than smaller energy consumers because that is what it needs to do and that it will likely focus on connections in the first instance to get it as early as possible, with the largest incremental steps. We have that Government policy statement and it is, I believe, down to the individual entities to do it. However, we are not doing it in isolation, if I can put it that way. We interact with the enterprise agencies and with other Departments. We tell them what we are doing and that we are operating in the knowledge that we might be among the first out of the traps with the upcoming consultation on demand-side strategy, which means we will possibly be a little exposed and, therefore, we want all of our allies in the delivery of Government policy to also be in a position to discuss what they are doing and how they will interact with that conversation. We have a certain mandate, if I could put it that way, and it could be hard to operate much without that.