Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have an opportunity to speak on this important issue. It is of growing importance. I have been concerned for the past number of days in listening to the debate on data centres and investment in this country and I want to comment on that.

Like the Minister, I am committed to alternative energy, bioenergy and the non-fossil fuel-based generation of electricity but we have to make it happen. The Minister and I were both members of a committee in 2006 where these issues were examined exhaustively for at least six months.

Hearings were held and depositions were taken from various interested bodies. The conclusion reached was that wind-generated electricity was a clean alternative method of generating electricity. The problem was the question of what we would do when the wind did not blow. It was generally accepted that alternatives had to be found. The possibility then considered was of an international grid on the basis that the wind would always be blowing somewhere, as we all know. We have enough experience of that ourselves in this country. There are some locations where the wind seems never to stop blowing. Other issues arose.

What should have happened then - it happened in some parts of the country, but not across it - was the putting in place of a number of electricity-generating wind farms, but it did not happen because there were objections for various reasons. There was stiff resistance, including from politicians. Some of the resistance was shakily based, for want of a better description. People said openly that we would never reach a point at which we would have to change our habits as regards fossil fuels and that such a change would be defied. If people want to live that kind of life, that is grand, but we did not provide the alternatives. When the resistance grew, people buckled and stood down. I was not one of them. I stood my ground, and still do. I was right then and we are right today. If we do not provide the alternatives sooner rather than later, we will pay a high price across a range of areas.

Something that worries me is us being expected to reduce our dairy and beef herds. That is a big request and will have a significantly negative impact on this country's rural and economic life. At the same time, there is clear evidence from other parts of the globe that the reverse is happening. Rainforests are being cleared and replaced with factory farms with all the kinds of emissions we are being told we must control. We accept all that. We accept that people in those places must live as well and that the global economy should try to compensate people who have lower incomes and standards of living, but rural Ireland's two main industries are being asked to shut down. They are the same two industries that shored up this economy when the economic crash happened. That is where logic comes into it and people ask us whether we are serious and really believe all of this. They point to Brazil and all the other countries where the opposite is happening. As the Minister knows, I am not being critical about this, but there is a need to ensure the argument we make is sustainable and that we can explain it to our electorate. We depend for our support on that electorate.

As to how to bridge the gap up to next summer, there is liquid biogas and liquefied petroleum gas, LPG. We must make interim arrangements to get over the immediate problem, that is, the possibility of blackouts. Normally, approximately 2,000 MW is required as a reserve at peak load. That is the way it used to be and I am not sure how much it has changed since 2006, but it has probably got bigger. Unfortunately, EirGrid stated in 2014 that we had ample generation capacity, there was no need for any more and there was no need at the time for western wind farms. What was not recognised, however, was that our economy was flat at the time. We had had an economic crash and just a little new generation sufficed. The situation is different now and the economy is taking off.

The unfortunate part of the debate over the past week has been how it has sought to divide opinion in the country between the domestic market, including householders, and inward investment. That is a dangerous place to go. In light of worldwide competition for investment in jobs, data centres or whatever will have a quick look, and if they find out there is resistance building up, they will want to know about it. They will go off to Denmark. Do not forget that, in the Athenry case, two locations were processed and approved in Denmark while we were still toying around with our first one. That will not wash. We will soon disintegrate into a backwater if we allow ourselves to go down that road.

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