Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)

I accept that uptake on the current microgeneration support scheme has been slow to date. This scheme is provided by the ESB and offers a guaranteed price of 19 cent per kilowatt hour of electricity produced and exported to the grid.

In line with my objective to increase deployment of microgeneration technologies, my Department is working closely with the Sustainable Energy Authority to build on the experience gained from the field trials undertaken and to assess the options for increased market deployment. Technical and safety standards are being developed and options for possible new support measures are being explored.

The existing ESB scheme is focused on domestic scale technologies with an 11 kV size limit. I have asked my Department to examine a range of larger scale technologies which would be appropriate for deployment at farm, small business and community level. I am pushing to get this work completed as soon as possible because I am keen for people in rural areas to benefit directly from the natural resources that are available.

See this speech in context