Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 5 October 2021
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action
Energy Charter Treaty, Energy Security, Liquefied Natural Gas and Data Centres: Discussion (resumed)
Mr. Jim Gannon:
I do not believe that the security of supply review has been consulted on yet. It is something for the Department but I certainly do not believe it has been consulted upon yet.
On the interconnectors and the Greenlink interconnector, we came out with a decision on the regulatory framework for same, which allows them to move that project forward. It has moved quite swiftly through the respective statutory processes in Ireland and Wales. The project developer is quite ambitious about the timeframe for bringing that on board. There are fewer barriers in place. On the Celtic interconnector and where it is in the process, it still has a number of statutory processes to complete but it is significantly under way. It is a project being developed by EirGrid.
EirGrid may wish to comment on that. We and our team are ready, mobilised and moving on the regulatory framework for same. For our part of the process, we are moving on that.
On the data centres, I think there were 52 responses. There were certainly approximately 50 responses. Believe it or not, that is significant for one of our consultations given some of them are quite dense and complex. It was a good mix of people who came to the table on that one.