Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)

I thank my friend and former colleague for the gracious introduction. It is the first time I have had an opportunity to be back in the Seanad since my election to the other House. I have fond memories of my ten years here. It was five years at the beginning and five more recently. I thank Senator again for that and I look forward to being back on many occasions in the future.

I also thank the Senator for raising this important issue. As she knows, the Government has an energy vision to fulfil the commitment to increase the proportion of renewable electricity to 80% by 2030. In Ireland, nuclear powered electricity generation plants remain prohibited and there are no plans to change this position. The Seanad has previously debated the option of nuclear energy as part of a broader debate on carbon policy and the practical challenges outlined relating to nuclear generation in Ireland are still relevant and still exist. The priority of the Government is on taking urgent action to make electricity generation in Ireland more sustainable. The climate action plan sets out a roadmap to halve Ireland’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. The annual climate action plans to date have also recognised the need for a range of supporting measures to enable the transformation of the electricity sector. This will involve the development of a balanced portfolio of technologies to facilitate the energy transition complementing other measures, such as demand-side response, network development and interconnection to support a grid with increased levels of renewable electricity.

I am delighted that the Senator has highlighted the Celtic interconnector, which will return Ireland's most direct connectivity to the European electricity market. That will have benefits for consumers too. This means greater energy security and increased system resilience for Ireland, the importance of which has been highlighted by recent events on the Iberian Peninsula. Interconnection facilitates the system balancing necessary to incorporate variable renewables. It assists in managing our emissions targets and enables Ireland to take advantage of the energy mixes of our energy partners mitigating the domestic infrastructural investment burden. Interconnectors also create competitive market pressures designed to drive down costs to the consumer, all of which the Senator identified as constraints and concerns from an Irish perspective.

As set out in the national policy statement on electricity interconnection in 2023, Ireland is on course to increase its connectivity capacity fivefold this decade. The Greenlink interconnector commenced commercial operations in January, doubling existing connectivity capacity. The Celtic interconnector will be operational in 2027. A further connection to the UK, MaresConnect, is currently progressing its regulatory and permitting journey. Ireland’s energy vision is clear. We do not have uranium. We do have some of the best offshore wind resources in the world. Building on the renewables progress on land, the east coast offshore wind farms are at planning permission stage following the first offshore renewable electricity support scheme, ORESS. Looking beyond 2030, the Oireachtas approved its first offshore renewable designated maritime area plan, DMAP off the south coast, with a further ORESS planned this year. Building on that vital experience Ireland will be progressing a national offshore renewable electricity, ORE, DMAP intended to deliver a further 15 GW of offshore wind generation. We intend to make further announcements on that later in the summer.

We intend to take advantage of the energy domestically delivering decarbonised economic growth. The programme for Government also commits Ireland to positioning itself as a future electricity operator, with Irish wind facilitating the achievement by our energy partners of their climate and energy goals. Further electricity interconnection will be key to that. We are working directly with the UK, France and Belgium to explore further connection. We are also working through regional fora, such as the North Seas Energy Cooperation and the Offshore TSO Collaboration. We are also working with the European Commission to help shape the evolution of European energy policy and to make Ireland central to Europe's shared energy future.