Ossian Smyth (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for her comments. I am glad to hear she acknowledges that we need data centres. I heard the same from Sinn Féin when Senator Boylan said that we absolutely need data centres. There is an understanding that we are not just going to shut down all of the data centres or prevent them from being here.

The Deputy's question is on the quantity of data centres which we can have or which is appropriate for the size of our country. Clearly, we are specialising in this country in the pharmaceutical and tech sectors. They are providing more than €20 billion a year in corporate taxes which fund our health programme, our education programme and so on. That is just in corporate taxes alone. Huge quantities of money are also coming from that sector in the form of income taxes and VAT.

The question is to what extent we can build data centres while at the same time maintaining our security of supply and meeting our climate targets. The new data centre policy said that one cannot build a data centre without building a sufficient additional quantity of renewable energy, so that it is powered 100% by renewable energy which would not have been on the grid otherwise. One must have a grid connection. The CRU and EirGrid are responsible for ensuring that grid connection does not interrupt our security of supply.

Back-up power must also be provided. I am glad to see that back-up power in many data centres is being provided with biofuel. Even on the rare occasions when the back-up power is needed it does not produce additional emissions. Our new data centre policy is very appropriate and it is working. It contributes towards security of supply and helps us to meet our climate targets.

See this speech in context