Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

We are engaged in a support process on onshore renewables. The Deputy is right in that we will need further onshore wind and solar energy, batteries, pump storage and a range of other solutions as we transition to this zero-carbon, stable, secure and lower-cost energy system for our people. The RESS auctions systems will continue. We have done two of them. The third will come up and we have learned lessons from the first two. In the coming weeks, if not days, we will be setting out the renewable support scheme which we will use for offshore energy. There is a potential project in Sceirde Rocks or on the east coast. We are competing, as the Deputy says, with the UK, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. There is a long as one's arm of countries with a similar ambition. Thus, we need to be quick.

The expectation is that our auction system will start before the end of this year and conclude in spring or summer of next year. The planning system then has to engage. The timeline that will take is the key unknown in answer to Deputy Ó Cuív's question but if it was concluded and projects then ready for contracting early or in mid-2024, construction would start in the period 2025 to 2026. It is in that sort of timeframe we need to deliver. While we are doing that, there are other projects onshore that we also need to deliver.

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