Results 2,301-2,320 of 8,768 for speaker:Alice-Mary Higgins
- Seanad: Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2022: Committee Stage (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I will take it from the Senator.
- Seanad: Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2022: Committee Stage (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 20: In page 13, to delete line 35.
- Seanad: Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2022: Committee Stage (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 21: In page 13, line 35, to delete “16 years” and substitute “18 years”.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I might follow up on the questions about the subsidies. It is striking that households and families have been subsidising 1,500 of the largest energy users for 12 years. Some clear questions have been asked, so I will try to add something different on top of them, to look at how this happened not just over 12 years but in particular over the past three or four years. Over the past three...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: One of the things that was happening during that period of time was the consultation that CRU had in relation to data centres. In that consultation, CRU was discussing whether there should be a continued expansion of data centres in the context of the electricity demands that come with that. Again, obviously one of the factors that would have been relevant in such a consultation was the...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I am speaking specifically about data centres.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: With respect, the context was not that different in that we still had the climate goals and were in a climate crisis. In the public consultation, it was one of the issues that was raised strongly. Again, in 2021 two decisions were made. First, there was an option to have a moratorium on new connections until we had full safety but the decision was made to continue with new connections but...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I have a final question.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: My very final one is about-----
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: ----moving away from gas. We have been behind on two areas. I would like a note on gas. Why are we still having new private and domestic gas connections?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: We are putting that on top of all of those gas-powered facilities we have agreed to in the past two years, however.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I have just three questions and maybe one short comment which was a kind of a question I had asked the last time. A huge subsidisation has been made from 2010, a permanent rebalancing. During the 2021 consultation on a potential moratorium for large energy users when the public had their chance to give their views on large energy users, why was the relevant information not given to the...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: We have heard a lot about the decarbonisation and the potential for green hydrogen down the line. We may look at certain limited uses for green hydrogen in particular targeted areas. Decarbonisation is one part, but we should be reducing reliance on gas and exiting from it. The gas sector as a whole should be shrinking. Even if green hydrogen comes on stream the general advice...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: With absolute respect, I would suggest this is an area where CRU is very much behind the curve again. In two years' time we will probably hear that we should have done more about reducing reliance on gas, which is what we have had on each of these issues. They have all been well flagged. We are losing two to three years and we do not have many years. We have about ten years to get to our...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: I asked two other questions on standing charges and smart meters.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: Yes. Is it not essential that the standard charges be addressed? Otherwise, the benefits from schemes will be reduced significantly. We have heard a great deal about the advertising of smart meters and my other question related to people who wanted to remove a smart meter. What are their options? That standing charges can increase in an unregulated way is undermining the uptake of...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Engagement with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (31 Jan 2023)
Alice-Mary Higgins: Yes. I am not being reassured that people can choose to move away from having their information transmitted. People may sign up and later decide that they do not want to continue with that system. Under GDPR, it does not seem proportionate to require half-hourly information to be transmitted. I hope people engage and believe people are engaging in energy-efficiency practices but there is a...