Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Minister on and thank him for his recent important work on behalf of Ireland.

I will discuss wind energy, particularly offshore wind energy. I want to highlight two points. The first is the proposal near my constituency for the Kish and Bray banks. I support offshore wind energy completely. The opportunity for cheaper electricity, energy security and to shift away from fossil fuels to renewable sources is a no-brainer. When the proposal was put forward, I, like everybody who saw it, had many questions, such as the following. Why does it have to be put there? Could it not be put further out? What about the impact on the seabed? Should I be concerned about that? How will the energy come back in? These are natural questions people have in any case, but particularly with a big physical change.

My approach and that of the Fine Gael Party has been to get and provide information in a factual way to people. They are located there because there is a deep sea channel in the Irish Sea which makes if difficult to put things further out. People say they have seen fixed turbines located 80 km off the coast of Denmark. Why can we not do that here? The reason is that there is a deep sea shipping channel, which is why Dublin Port is where it is. These are reasonable questions and people deserve answers.

On biodiversity, there was a lot of concern among local coastal groups and it is always important to raise any such concerns. I got very good answers from the Department of the marine on that. I went further and spoke to the Climate Change Advisory Council on the matter and to the excellent Yvonne Buckley in Trinity College Dublin, who has carried out significant studies on the opportunity for new ecosystem development at the bases of fixed turbines. It is clear from that body of research that, first, the question does not take account of the biodiversity impact of the status quoand the failure to shift from fossil fuels to renewables. Second, it is clear from the emerging evidence that new topographies on the seabed create their own space free from shipping and other interference, where new ecosystems can develop. That is a significant opportunity. As far as I can see from the academic research, going beyond what is provided by the Departments, it is firmly favourable.

In the context of offshore wind energy, we have a significant opportunity off the west coast, in particular in relation to floating wind energy. There is concern around security. It is not apparent from a policy perspective that we are having a conversation around security, either in terms of delivery or design considerations. The Garda Síochána Act 2004 indicates that gardaí have jurisdiction as far out as the continental shelf, but we need a policy conversation about how that will work and where security will be vested, whether in the Defence Forces or not. That is not just for physical security but also as a crisis response. It is obvious from the attack by rogue regimes in the Baltic on Gazprom that these new pieces of infrastructure could become targets of such regimes and of disruption to the European or Irish energy grid. It is important that conversations are held now with developers and designers, as well as at Government level, about managing the physical security around offshore floating wind energy.

Ireland has the opportunity to be the centre of gravity in Europe for offshore wind energy. It is nothing but an opportunity but I worry. We will not meet our 2030 target of 7 GW but we should press on anyway because the opportunity is so significant. Once that machine starts going and developers see trapped electrons coming onshore, it will accelerate and expedite. The one policy piece I would press with the Minister relates to a conversation now, not later, on building physical security into design information stage.

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