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

I thank the Senators for their contributions. As Senators are aware, this Bill has been introduced to reorganise Ervia. Ervia was a holding company that owned Irish Water, and it also owned Gas Networks Ireland.Irish Water has been spun out and is now an independent company. We are now left with a structure where there is simply a company called Ervia that owns Gas Networks Ireland which then performs its functions. We are eliminating Ervia and we are folding the functions of Gas Networks Ireland into Ervia. It is very much technical legislation in which we are making sure we do not lose any of the functionality of the existing organisation. That is the scope of this legislation; it is mostly technical. I am happy to address the various points made by the Senators and I will engage on Committee Stage on any of the amendments that are put forward.

As the Senators are probably aware, the gas package was recently passed by the EU. It was agreed at a trilogue between the European Commission, the Council of the European Union and the European Parliament. That included the regulation and a directive which is focused on decarbonisation of gas companies and the use in the future of hydrogen and biogas instead of methane.

Senator Dooley mentioned the end of Irish Water, the spike in gas prices as a result of the war in Ukraine and the interaction he had with the Estonian Commissioner, Kadri Simson, in Clare. The Shannon Estuary in Clare is going to become a centre of activity. I do not think the media have come around to the idea that Ireland, which up to now has been dependent on fossil fuel imports for electricity, is now moving into a transition period where, within a few years, we will become a country that is energy independent, that is sovereign and more self-sufficient, and that is exporting electricity. It is a huge change from being a country that is dependent on others for energy to being an exporting country. Clare, Kerry and the Shannon Estuary will be a centre of this. A lot of power will be generated there. This is the region of the country where we first had our electricity generation a hundred years ago, where Moneypoint is situated and where we have many very strong grid connections. It is going to continue and the area is going to be revitalised. As I said, I do not think the media have realised this yet. It has not yet entered the national consciousness that we are on this journey of transition.

Senator Dooley also mentioned that the development will be dependent on floating, offshore wind power, which is true, and that this is not yet a wide-scale commercial technology. It is only available in demonstrator projects, although it is certainly coming. It is not something on the never-never like some other technologies such as cold fusion. It is a very viable and feasible technology that is coming. Demonstrator projects exist already in Portugal and Scotland, and I think one of the committees was taken to visit some of these. The Senator suggested we should be doing one as well and I agree with him. We should be doing a demonstrator project in Ireland.

The Senator said that there should be Government involvement in this project. It will be a major piece of research for the country. We will be moving to a situation where we have 32 GW of offshore wind generation. At current prices, that is an approximately €70 billion investment between now and the end of 2040. It is a huge amount of activity, it is about to happen and it is a very promising future for Ireland and the west of the country in particular. A whole lot of new industries will be enabled as result. Countries like Norway and Iceland that have large surplus of electricity run industries that add value through the use of cheap electricity, and we are going to be in that market as well.

Senator McGahon made points along the same lines. He also pointed out that this legislation is badly needed. It is technical in nature but these things have to be done. It is a tidying-up operation but it is also the final separation of Irish Water from Gas Networks Ireland and to the creation of a new, independent entity.

Senator Boylan asked if this is an opportunity to extend the freedom of information legislation to other commercial semi-State bodies. The freedom of information legislation is being extended to Gas Networks Ireland, which is absolutely right. It is a major organisation in terms of its environmental impact so it certainly should be subject to FOI. If Senator Boylan would like to engage with me on how she would like to amend the FOI Act, I am happy to look at that. It is very unlikely to happen in this legislation, the scope of which is about renaming the gas company. On Senator Boylan's other points, she mentioned data centres and she is absolutely right that our islanded data centres are contrary to Government policy and we need a mechanism to prevent them from being developed. We will not require legislation for that. It will be done in the form of a planning direction which is being worked on at the moment. It uses the existing powers under the Planning and Development Act 2000.

Coming back to the legislation in hand, I acknowledge the significant work of the Attorney General and his officials and industry stakeholders with whom we consulted to get this legislation done. I also extend my appreciation to the Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action, which conducted the pre-legislative scrutiny of the general scheme of this Bill last year. The report was published last July and, of course, was considered in detail in the drafting process of the Bill. I thank all the Senators for their interest. I look forward to discussing in further detail any proposals to amend or improve the Bill on Committee Stage.