Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action
Long-Duration Energy Storage: Discussion
11:00 am
Mr. Bobby Smith:
I will have a go at this and if the other guys want to come in, that will be absolutely fine. We do see some interest in it but pumped storage is very geographically specific and there are other countries which have those features that are much more conducive to it. We are looking at Scotland, countries in Scandinavia and Switzerland, for instance, where they have lots of it built out with large valleys, peaks and everything they can naturally use. We do not necessarily have a lot of that landscape in Ireland, so we have not seen a lot of projects go forward. That being said, I have seen new types of pumped-storage technology which is an evolution of the older technology. It is a bit more efficient and needs less voluminous reservoirs and heights between the different reservoirs even. There could be an angle there for projects to progress. Again, they should compete and if they are the best technology, they can absolutely win. That is where we stand on that. Again, we are technology agnostic. It should be allowed. If we are looking at the traditional style of pumped storage, that is pretty limited in terms of the feasibility in Ireland at the moment. The others may want to add something there.