Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 16 July 2025

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate, Environment and Energy

Climate Change Targets 2026-2030: Electricity Sector

2:00 am

Mr. Cathal Marley:

Again, we must separate generation from the grid. The grid is operating effectively. What we are watching on the grid is that as we take on more renewables, we just need to make sure we do that very carefully so that we do not have an Iberian Peninsula issue, which was not a generation issue, it was a grid issue.

In terms of generation capacity, there have been a lot of auctions, so that is helping. We have also brought in temporary emergency generators. Between that and Moneypoint, which are out of market as they are not part of the normal market, there are about 1,400 MW, which gives us protection. If something happens, they will step in and give us protection. Hopefully we will not need them but they are there. As the years go on we should be able to remove both of those completely from the system, but that will take a number of years. We have the protection in place.

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