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

I thank the witnesses. The presentations were very interesting. What jumps out at me is that there is a huge long-term opportunity with the 22 GW of renewable power that we hope to deliver by 2030 and beyond. Data centres are probably one of the most effective uses of that in the long term compared with hydrogen or other options. We have a long-term opportunity and very real short-term constraints.

I will start with a question to Ms Donnelly. How do we crack the things that she spelt out there, such as spatial planning guidelines, hybrid connections, private wires – I am not sure what they are about - guidelines for onshore wind, planning delays and regulatory treatment of battery storage? Those are the constraints that Ms Donnelly recognises, which mean we have only 70 MW of wind energy approved, and even one part of that is appealed. We have massive constraints in delivering our ambition. I am sure people are working with might and main to try to deliver these but is there a way in which we can crack these constraints that appear to be very serious ones? That is the first question. Is there low-hanging fruit within this or are these very long-term, like the planning legislation reform which, with the best will in the world, is going to take some time to impact?

Second, what are the lessons to be drawn from the fact we ran into short-term constraints and had the need to acquire backup generation under very unusual conditions? Are there things we need to do beyond what we have already done? Mr. Dermot McCarthy said that the risk of capacity shortfall was underestimated and he seems to point to the fact there is no single owner of planning risk and the design of mechanisms left something to be desired. In fact, it was the procurement of conventional generation that let us down, not the procurement of the new breed of technology. I am interested in finding out what are the lessons that we are to draw beyond the constraints that Ms Donnelly has described being put on data centres.

To go back to what Senator Dooley said, it seems to me that one of the efficiency gains for small Irish businesses will be to migrate to the cloud, and it will be a lot more efficient than what they are doing now. Are we unwittingly constraining data centres that would allow that transition to happen? Are we slowing down something that needs to happen because of these constraints? Are the restrictions that have been published a bit of a blunt instrument?

Should every data centre have a corporate purchasing agreement regardless? Are there some that might fit into an efficient change in the way businesses are now operating, with a more efficient platform with a lower carbon footprint, rather than just allowing that to continue on? Do we need more subtlety in how we are constraining data centres, rather than just these two measures, which make a lot of sense, corporate power purchase agreements and heat exportability? In the grand order of things and for the bigger data centres they make sense, but are they fit for all data centre developments? I would be interested to hear the response to that.