Joe McHugh (Donegal North East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The 2009 EU renewable energy directive set Ireland a legally binding target of meeting 16% of our energy requirements from renewable sources by 2020. To meet this target, Ireland is committed to meeting 40% of electricity demand, 12% of heating and 10% of transport power from renewable sources. Provisional figures provided by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, for 2014 show that 8.6% of Ireland's overall energy requirement was met by renewable energy. More specifically, the SEAI has calculated that 22.6% of electricity, 6.7% of heat and 5.2% of transport were met from renewable sources. While the progress to date is encouraging, significant challenges remain, especially in the heat and transport sectors. Meeting our renewable electricity targets will require the delivery of critical grid infrastructure and the construction of additional renewable electricity generation capacity.

Regarding renewable electricity, the Renewable Energy Feed In Tariff, REFIT, schemes underpin the development of a range of technologies, including hydro, biomass combustion, biomass combined heat and power, landfill gas and onshore wind. These schemes will be closed to new applications at the end of this year. In terms of renewable heat, in addition to existing measures such as Part L of the building regulations, the 2014 draft bioenergy plan recommended the introduction of a renewable heat incentive for larger heat users to change to heating solutions that produce heat from renewable sources.

On 31 July, the Department launched two separate consultations on new support schemes, one for renewable electricity and one for a proposed renewable heat incentive. While the initial phase of both consultations closed on 18 September 2015, there will be two further opportunities to contribute at key stages in the design of any new scheme. Subject to Government approval and state aid clearance from the European Commission, the new schemes will become available in 2016.

As regards renewable transport, Ireland aims to meet its target mainly through the use of sustainable biofuels. Increasing usage of electric vehicles will also make a contribution. Further increases to the obligation rate in the biofuels obligation scheme will be required in the context of achieving our 2020 target, and the Minister intends to initiate a consultation on this over the coming weeks.

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