Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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I thank Mr. Slye for his presentation. I have some brief questions and will unfortunately have to leave the meeting shortly.

There have been some significant developments in the area of offshore wind in recent weeks, years and months. Denmark, Holland and Germany are starting to see offshore wind coming in at five cent per kW hour, which is a fraction of what it was even three or four years ago due to the nature of the bidding system.

It is interesting that the UK Government has changed its modelling forecast for 2030. The key aspects can be summarised as it forecasting that its PAR demand would come from an additional 12 gW of combined cycle gas, 12 gW of offshore wind and, more interestingly, 12 gW interconnection. In that regard, it is clear is from listening to the European Commission that projects in the future might include a European co-ordinated project in the Irish Sea. There could be 3 gW of offshore wind and the Isle of Man could be used as a converter station base. Scotland could be connected through boot straps and Ireland and Wales could be connected. It would be a very beneficial project in terms of developing offshore wind competitively and providing energy security for Ireland, Scotland and England.

I get no sense that EirGrid is interested in other interconnectors that should be in play. Why would we allow the project to become a private developer project? Why would we not continue our tradition of public ownership, including the east-west interconnector, of the transmission assets? It would make eminent sense. I believe we would get significant funding from the European Union for the project. It is a project of common interest and would receive funding from Juncker. People are dying to invest in this area and the economics are now right.

I am delighted that there will be a French interconnector, but how can we roll over the Irish Sea with ambitions? Having shown that we can do it already, we should be the lead developer in the Irish Sea. We know how to do it and we should deploy the expertise of the witnesses.

In terms of Brexit, Mr. Slye is correct about getting the all-island electricity market right. Given that we have an interconnector, surely one of the other issues we have to work out in the Brexit negotiations is our east-west trade. What talks have started in that regard? It is interesting that Commissioner Barnier will come before the Houses on Thursday. The Commission seems to be saying that we cannot talk about anything with Britain until the Brexit bill and so on is sorted out.

Surely we must talk to National Grid and others about how the east-east interconnector will operate in a post-Brexit world. Will we have to wait for the Commission to give approval for us to start talking about that sort of stuff? I would be interested in hearing about the negotiations that are taking place, not just on the island network or pricing arrangements, but those pertaining to the east-west interconnector.

If I recall correctly, the last major update in terms of grid investment plans was in 2014. In some ways, it involves a scaling back of the original grid plans. Three scenarios were referred to in terms of future demand, that is, low, medium and high. Can Mr. Slye give me the demand per tW hour for 2016? Where are we in terms of the low, medium or high scenario?

From the outside, it seems that given the number of new data centres that there must be a significant increase in demand. Is that starting to cause Mr. Slye to question some of the investment forecasts made only three or four years ago when there had not been an increase in growth for several years? It seems to me that demand must be changing. Is that forcing EirGrid to consider its investment projects for onshore grid investment within our grid?