Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I wish to return also to the issue of offshore wind. I have raised already the frustration among stakeholders with the delays in getting the infrastructure up and running, particularly for floating offshore wind. We constantly hear from the Government about the enormous potential of offshore wind, but there has been such immense delay in getting these projects started. What is the State doing to speed up publicly owned offshore wind projects. Is the ESB appropriately resourced to speed up development? It says it has plans for 5 GW of offshore wind, but how close are we to getting ESB projects approved and constructed, and can we say for sure that consideration has been given to the royalties, lease payments or taxation of the windfalls operators will make? I am looking at the British approach, whereby we see the Crown Estate making huge profits from new offshore wind farms by leasing sites, with a £1 billion surge this year alone. I think there are examples elsewhere that we can use as to how money can go back to the public purse from the generation of more offshore wind.

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