Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have many questions. However, since I have only five minutes, I will not spend too long on the process, except to say it is unacceptable. What has happened has now happened on three occasions. It does not look like an emergency but a question of the actual strategy. Therefore, with great respect, I disagree with Senator Conway, who talked about planning. If there had been planning, we would have had proper engagement well in advance. We had only 45 minutes between being given the Bill and being asked to waive pre-legislative scrutiny. We were given it only when we pressed to get a copy. Actually, we were asked to waive pre-legislative scrutiny even before we saw the Bill. That is extraordinarily bad parliamentary practice. It has happened three times. At this point, it has become a pattern. It becomes unacceptable if we see this time and again. I hope that, in another area of government, we do not expect the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, for example, to introduce his planning proposals to the Seanad in the last week of July and tell us it is a big emergency again. We have seen these patterns emerging. The Government is doing no service to our democracy or public confidence therein by establishing habits and using measures to short-circuit proper scrutiny. This leads to poor decisions and legal uncertainty. This is the situation in which we find ourselves, dealing with something we were told had been done in October. This is not doing a service to democracy, the Government or the outcomes, and it is certainly not doing a service to the parliamentary process.

Regarding the specific proposals, there is a giant chain of elephants in the room, namely the large energy users, specifically data centres. They are deeply relevant in this context. On the same day we met officials, we received a briefing from the Department on energy security separately. The Department, in referring to energy security and demand, stated last week that large energy users will continue to necessitate growing levels of dispatchable generation capacity to be available on days with low wind and interconnection availability. Therefore, the Department is telling us it is large energy users that need dispatchable generation. Here we hear about the lights going out and get the examples of civic services and the hospitals but we must be clear that we are being told why there is increasing energy demand. In that context, it is very relevant for us to ask what is being done about demand management in both the short term and medium term. The CRU, with the Government’s agreement, actively chose two years ago not to place a moratorium on data centre development until provision had been made. A moratorium was one of three options considered but it was rejected.

Our second amendment was useful but was ruled out of order. Maybe the Minister of State can address the issues it was to cover. We were told in the briefing that, in each instance, temporary generation capacity is meant to be used only where there is emergency demand and where no other way can be found to address it. Maybe the Minister of State will confirm that. We were told there would be a suite of other measures – for example, demand reduction measures that might be sought before seeking to dispatch additional, temporary emergency energy. However, we have no information on what that consists of. For example, will large energy users be asked to pause or limit their use of energy temporarily? Will they be required to do so? Why do we not have legislation requiring large energy users to abate their demand on our energy at key points?

Another part of the puzzle, which comes through again, relates to a huge gap. Just this week, the CRU gave us an answer on backup generators in data centres. We asked whether these generators would use diesel or gas. We were told the centres simply required backup generators but the fuel type for dispatchable generation was not specified. Again, the CRU is choosing not to find out what kind of backup generation data centres will have, and the Government is not requiring it to do so. In that context, we have a huge blind spot that we refuse to look at and that will have a massive impact. Let us be clear that it is not a brilliant solution if a centre starts using a diesel generator for backup and we do not even know it, seek to know it or measure it.

What specific measures will be applied each time temporary energy is dispatched? How will the associated demand be measured? Will we know what drove it and what ameliorating measures were tried? Could the Minister of State comment on Article 7 of the environmental impact assessment directive and how that directive will be complied with, including in respect of the measure relating to other citizens across Europe who get to be considered even as Irish citizens are short-circuited in the process?