Professor Barry McMullin:

It was about Gas Networks Ireland and those particular data centres. The gas grid is a public asset that, obviously, society at large has an interest in getting value out of and Gas Networks Ireland's remit, effectively, is to maximise the benefit to Irish society of that infrastructure. It is understandable that it will seek to maximise the opportunities for that.

Substituting natural gas with biomethane can go a little way towards decarbonisation. In theory, 100% biomethane could be used in place of 100% natural gas. That is the attraction of biomethane. The actual biomethane resource in Ireland is very limited, however. It is very constrained.

If it were to be ring-fenced for one particular purpose, we could identify certain large industry with no other way of decarbonising other than continuing to burn methane. There is some compelling reason why that is the right route. We are talking about less than 20% of current gas consumption. I would guess it is more like 10%. Will we continue to maintain the existing national network just to supply that 10%? I do not think so. We are looking at a fundamental re-evaluation of that national asset, which bits of it will be preserved and for what purpose. Can bits of it transition to 100% hydrogen? They probably can. However, it will be bits of it. Once we transition to 100% hydrogen, everybody hanging off that piece of infrastructure must transition to 100% hydrogen. That is a difficult thing to do. That should not be done with customers when they are all over the place. We want to look at clusters of use. We need a new mandate for Gas Networks Ireland to bring forward a plan for explaining the evolution of that infrastructure. Which bits of it will be fully retired and when? We would need a timescale for that. Which bits of it can transition to 100% hydrogen? Which bits might serve as 100% biomethane? Gas Networks Ireland is well able to respond to that challenge but, to date, it has not been given that challenge.