Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 28 February 2017

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment

Scrutiny of EU Legislative Proposals and Impact of Brexit on the Irish Energy Market: Discussion

5:00 pm

Mr. John Lawlor:

In terms of decarbonising the electricity system by 100%, that was not precisely what we said in public. I do not believe we actually said it. We have talked about decarbonising the energy system by between 80% to 95% and to do so, we see what I call intermittent renewables going to somewhere between 50% to 60% of the final electricity generation, the other 50% would be what I consider old technology of synchronous generators. Those synchronous generators might be biomass, which is zero carbon, carbon capture and storage, in which case there is always a residual amount of carbon going into the atmosphere. For cost reasons, they might be peaking plant, which may not even have carbon capturing storage. They will be largely decarbonised electricity system but there were still be a residual amount of carbon.