Mr. Cathal Lee:

There was a great deal in those questions. I will distil it down to two simple points. The first is what can be done now and how that can benefit people in a simple way. Ms McDonnell spoke about engagement with Clúid's residents. In one night out of every three last year, the residents were able to benefit from free water heating. That is the start of a just transition journey for many of those residents who were not engaged on the just transition because energy poverty is such a real thing for them.

The cost of modification is €300. Half of that relates to the installation. The key point is that it is about utilising existing assets. If we take 100,000 homes and put them together as a 3 kWh load, we have a 300 MW virtual power plant, for want of a better phrase. To do so, the infrastructure already exists to create the asset and this begins the journey.

On the question of what the SEAI or the regulator can do, the SEAI schemes have proven to be very successful at generating impetus to kick-start programmes, as it were. The scalability of this comes from local authority or approved housing body schemes whereby all residents are encouraged to opt in. This creates a scalability that would allow them to seek funding, support or grant aid from the SEAI. A long timeframe is not required; it can be done very quickly. The text messages residents get tell them that the renewable journey is happening for them and is benefiting them. The feedback I always hear from residents is that they are benefiting from renewable energy.

In terms of what can be done, there should definitely be engagement with the SEAI to have a specific programme for approved housing bodies and local authorities. The second thing to do is to work collaboratively with all the other State and semi-State actors to ensure that EnergyCloud is at the top of their agenda as they work to tackle energy poverty.