Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Question 49: To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources the initiatives he plans to take to encourage mutable providers of electric transport charging infrastructure to facilitate competing solutions and implementation; the progress that has been made on setting up new memorandums of understanding with car manufactures in the same way that has been done with a company (details supplied). [16856/10]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)
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The Government has set a target of 10% of all vehicles to be powered by electricity by 2020, which equates to around 225,000 vehicles.

Electric vehicles are an increasingly realistic option to the challenge of reducing the transport sector's greenhouse gas emissions and reducing our reliance on imported fossil fuels. There is now very significant global investment under way in research and development in this area. The technology is maturing to a point where large scale commercial deployment appears feasible in the short to medium term. There is keen interest internationally in Ireland's decision to be an early mover in this field. Ireland is seen as an excellent test-bed, particularly in terms of network infrastructure development.

In the European Union context, electric vehicles are now firmly on the EU energy policy agenda. We agreed at the informal meeting of energy Ministers in Seville last January that electric vehicles technology and common standards should be progressed by the European Union as part of delivery of energy efficient and low carbon systems.

Reflecting these discussions, the Commission is currently finalising a policy communication on green vehicles, which will be published shortly.

The Energy Council of Ministers has also recently agreed to the inclusion of electric vehicles as a priority technology sector under the strategic energy technology plan. ESB, through its membership of Eurelectric, is also playing a leading role in work by European utilities and car manufacturers to progress essential technical standardisation across Europe.

On 12 April last I signed an agreement with the Renault Nissan alliance and ESB which underpins Ireland as one of the European leaders in electric transport. The agreement, building on the memorandum of understanding last year, includes the development of a national electric car charging infrastructure, the continued sharing of technical and market data between the parties and the early supply of electric cars into the Irish market by Renault and Nissan from next year.

Under the agreement, ESB will roll out 1,500 charge points nationwide by December 2011. The roll-out has already begun in Dublin and charging points will also be installed in Cork, Galway, Waterford and Limerick. ESB also plans to install 30 fast charge points across Ireland by the end of 2011, with nine expected to be set up by the end of this year.

Progress has been made in discussions with other major motor manufacturers to make early production vehicles available to the Irish market and I expect that other agreements will be developed in the foreseeable future.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I support what the Minister is trying to do in terms of making the transition from combustion engine cars to electric transport and mainstreaming that technology, and that mindset, to ensure people realise we can have normal family cars that are comfortable, powerful and safe but which are driven on batteries on the Irish electricity grid rather than by imported fossil fuels. I question the Minister's approach, however, and want to ask him a number of direct questions.

First, why is it the case that even though we have had a memorandum of understanding with Renault-Nissan, and ESB, for many months we do not have a second memorandum of understanding with any other car manufacturers, despite the fact that has been promised for over six months and that almost every car manufacturer on the globe is planning to roll out electric vehicles? Why have we put in place a memorandum of understanding with one of them, Renault-Nissan, but not any others?

The second question is more important. I commend ESB for its involvement in this area but I am concerned that we are creating a monopoly here in what is probably the most exciting industry area that will develop rapidly in the next ten years whereby ESB is the only body providing charging infrastructure, and the technology around that technology, for electric cars. Why is that the case? Would the Minister consider issuing a global tender on behalf of the Government for expressions of interest in providing solutions to put in place an ambitious charging infrastructure to facilitate the complete transition he envisages in the next 20 years? Why has he resisted that approach to try to get the best technology into Ireland?

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I will call the Deputy again.

Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)
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On the two questions, first, our intention is to bring in a number of different motor car companies to provide vehicles for this market as it evolves. I believe further agreements will be signed with other companies. I had a meeting with Mitsubishi recently and it seemed to me that we are close to signing an agreement with that company, among others. The real success we have had is getting some of these leading companies to come here because, to be honest, there is a limited number of vehicles available in the world. Our objective was to try to get some of them to develop the activity here first and the economic benefits that come with that in terms of the spin-off industries that will develop the charging points, the software systems, the payment systems and the management systems that will be needed to make this work. We are open to dealing with other companies. We have always made this a neutral development in that all car companies are welcome as long as the technology is compatible.

The issue is the same on the grid. We are not looking to restrict other companies in terms of developing charge point infrastructure. It has to be a common design, however. One action that is happening, and in fairness to ESB it has been leading it, is in regard to Eurelectric. We are looking to get agreement across Europe, and in other parts of the world, on a common type charging infrastructure to ensure the cars come with a standard recharging mechanism. One of the reasons for doing that is that it is non-restrictive. It is not creating a monopoly. It is opening up the market to other companies to provide similar infrastructure.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I hope the Minister will accept that I would welcome new memoranda of understanding with companies like Mitsubishi and, I hope, many others. My main concern is regarding charging infrastructure. The Minister said there is no obstacle to other potential operators of charging infrastructure as long as they all abide by the requirement for standard plugs and so on. That is obvious. We must have the same plug to allow us switch from one system to another but we should be encouraging a non-standardised approach towards clever charging systems tailored for different usages. For example, the position of a TD who might drive 50,000 miles a year will be entirely different from that of an elderly person who drives to the shop three or four times a week. We want to encourage competition and new solutions from companies like Better Place and another half dozen that currently provide interesting, exciting solutions in other parts of the world. We want them all testing in Ireland and competing with ESB to ensure we get the best technology solutions for Irish consumers. We are saying there is no obstacle to inviting that into Ireland but we are asking ESB to do the job. I would like to see ESB tested and competed with to ensure we get the best possible solutions. That will probably be through an ESB dominated charging grid but if we do not invite those other tenders we will not be able to get the benefits of competition.

Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)
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I agree with the Deputy. I met with Shai Agassi of Better Place, one of the companies the Deputy mentioned, and said that we are open in that regard. This is new technology but we are at the frontier. We are the first country to put this out on a nationwide basis. This is one of the locations to which people will come to try to test out these systems.

In terms of the way this will develop and what ESB has agreed to, it is not exclusive to any one company to put in meters but in regard to its meters, we are saying it should be open to other suppliers also to use those charging points. Even though ESB might put in an extra piece of infrastructure, it would be on an open access basis in that another supply company could come in and provide some of the innovation or charging flexibility the Deputy mentioned. I believe the characteristics of this technology will work best when the network is more open and accessible to different technological solutions, be it a project like Better Place coming in with a battery changing system or a-----

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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What about a global tender to invite expressions of interest?

Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)
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The agreements with the leading international car companies are in effect exactly that. What we are seeing, with other companies such as IBM and its smart cities network coming in to work on the back of this, is a global tender. This is a global call from Ireland that we are going to develop this technology and inviting companies to test different systems here because we believe we will achieve economic benefit on the back of this.