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

I thank the witnesses for the really interesting presentations. I want to understand the ordering and what the State needs to do. So far, the auctions are only for three on the east coast and one on the west coast. The witness stated that even those are not yet bankable projects. There is a long way to go before we have a stream of bankable projects coming through this and subsequent auctions. How much of this early stage funding is needed? What is the State looking at in terms of an investment? I know the presentations mentioned a figure of a billion in investment but that was partly to do with the ports and was not exclusively in the offshore area. I am interested in getting a better handle on how governments are to order this process of upfront investing. Are there any models in other countries that we could look to? Did any country set up an Enterprise Ireland-type body that started to prioritise time and identify funding models that would work from the State's point of view as well as from the ports' and the industry's point of view? Do we have models to build on and how long is the State going to be out of pocket before it sees a flow? Presumably that weighs with people.

Allied to that, is there a pecking order we need to start considering, for example, starting with the east coast and then moving on when there is a line of sight on deliverable projects in other locations? Do ports have a specific geographic competitive advantage in that they can look at an array within a certain distance they can service in order that they are not competing with one another? It is to understand the process and how we can progress this.

Has an assessment been done for the business case for hydrogen production, sale and distribution? I know from a previous trip to Holland that Cork already has some links with the Dutch industry which is an enormous hub. What is the business case for hydrogen and how does that come together? Will it again require a lot of upfront State investment, taking the early phase capital strain, if you like? I would like to hear more from the witnesses as to how we might make that journey. It would allow lay people like ourselves to disentangle what we need to do and the order in which we need to do it.