Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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Senator Boylan has four minutes and can then come back in.

Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein)
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Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh, and I welcome the Minister of State. I am here to raise the deeply concerning proliferation of data centres in the country. It seems they are now a new frontier for extraction where our cool climate and windy hillsides are ripe for the taking. We know that data centres are popping up all over the country and with them comes windfarms and fossil fuel energy generators. Despite the best efforts of tech giants to greenwash the impact they are having, the figures do not lie. The surge in Irish data centres comes with a massive carbon footprint. They pretend that big tech is a clean industry but it requires a huge amount of energy to power the servers and fans to suck in cool air. Each video on file on the Internet has to be stored in these data centres.

By 2027 data centres will consume 31% of Ireland's electricity. Across Europe while energy use is decreasing, in Ireland we are an anomaly because it is increasing. That has nothing to do with our household or population growth. It is purely down to the rise in the number of data centres. They will require 12.5 TW of electricity above what is being provided. That is enough power for 24 million homes. These data centres should be treated like the carbon intensive industry that they are. It seems there is a greenwashing campaign in full spin because we hear that data centres will be 100% powered by renewables. However, the amount of energy projected to come from their windfarms is far outstripped by the demand from these data centres.On top of that, each megawatt of wind capacity must be backed up with energy generated from fossil fuels. This is not to mention the fallout of the biodiversity disaster in the Meenbog wind farm, which has a contract with Amazon. While pilot projects in which waste energy is sold to heat homes or public buildings are welcome, they barely put a dent in emissions.

When we hear talk of the cloud, it is as though it has no material impact but the truth is it is bad for climate and to date, the Government has given the industry a free pass while the public is left to carry the bulk of the massive cost for the infrastructure required to run these data centres. The Irish Academy of Engineering estimates that we will need €9 billion of new infrastructure. It seems the Government strategy has been so successful in attracting data centres that we now have an enormous and disproportionate amount of western Europe's data infrastructure, and with that comes these colossal CO2 emissions.

This begs the question as to what we are getting out of this deal. Will we get jobs? Not really, as after the short-term jobs used in construction, data centres do not require very many people to run them. I read the Government strategy and the headline benefit in the executive summary indicates that this will raise the international visibility of Ireland. It seems that what we are getting in return for hosting these data centres is some good public relations. I am sure the Tánaiste's spin doctor could come up with a bigger and cheaper way to do this with less of an impact on climate change.

Billions of euro in taxpayers' money are being siphoned off to benefit these big technological companies for what appears to be no tangible benefit but rather a massive environmental cost. Communities, non-governmental organisations and individuals have tried to stand up against these tech giants, as we have seen with the Athenry case, and they demonstrated the faults in the environmental impact assessment. Apart from what we are getting out of this deal, will the Government commit to reviewing the environmental and climate impact of the policies we have that support the proliferation of these data centres?

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I thank the Senator for raising this important matter and apologise on behalf of the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, who is attending an EU Council meeting today.

The Government's statement on the role of data centres in Ireland's enterprise strategy acknowledges the role of data centres as part of the digital and communications infrastructure for many sectors of our economy. The statement also noted that data centres pose considerable challenges to the future planning and operation of Ireland's power system. Such challenges arise in terms of renewable energy policy, generation adequacy, security of electricity supply and electricity customer costs.

The programme for Government commits to developing efficiency standards for equipment and processes, particularly those set to grow rapidly, such as data centres. The information and communications technology sector must undergo its own green transformation. Earlier this year the European Commission adopted Shaping Europe's Digital Future, which includes an objective to foster an open, democratic and sustainable society. Key actions include initiatives to achieve climate-neutral, highly energy-efficient and sustainable data centres by no later than 2030.

Data centres have, until recent years, accounted for less than 2% of Ireland's total electricity demand. EirGrid, in its generation capacity statement for 2019 to 2028, projects that demand from data centres could account for 29% of all demand by 2028. EirGrid, in its capacity as the transmission system operator, continually models and forecasts the predicted future growth of electricity demand in its published analysis, including the Tomorrow's Energy Scenarios.

EirGrid, the transmission system operator, published an updated data centre connection offer process and policy over the summer in line with the Government policy statement and the climate action plan. While data centres can consume very large amounts of energy, they have a flat and predictable demand profile, meaning they use the same amount of electricity day and night, therefore requiring a range of generation technologies to meet demand.

Significant increases in volumes of generation capacity, including from renewable energy resources, will be required to meet Ireland's electrification objectives and demand from heat pumps, electric vehicles and data centres. The climate action plan set an ambition of 70% renewable electricity by 2030, the majority of which will be met through the renewable electricity support scheme, RESS. The first auction under the RESS has taken place and this will see major upscaling in renewable energy projects connecting to the grid from 2021, with solar energy and community-owned projects supplying electricity in Ireland for the first time.

The climate action plan also provides that IDA Ireland will use its new strategy to fully integrate decarbonisation objectives across its portfolio of clients. This strategy will seek to ensure new large-scale enterprise investments in Ireland, including factors such as location and power purchase agreement opportunities, with alignment to the build-out of the grid to maximise renewable sources.

We have recently seen a number of unsubsidised corporate power purchase agreements, CPPAs, purchased by data centre operators. It is hoped we can encourage more in order to meet the target of 15% of electricity demand to be met by renewable sources contracted under corporate power purchase agreements by 2030. When data centre operators purchase electricity directly from renewable generators, it contributes to the State's objective to decarbonise our electricity system without any subsidy from electricity customers. Work is ongoing in the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, and following from a study by consultants Baringa Partners on policy options for meeting Ireland's targets of 15% of demand to be met by renewable energy sources under CPPAs. The SEAI will launch a public consultation in the coming weeks.

Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Minister of State. I note he states that data centres have a flat demand but this means they are more likely to rely on electricity generated by fossil fuels. I wonder if there has been a cost-benefit analysis of the gas generators used as backup for the data centres or the long-term impact of fossil lock-in. Is there any possibility that the Minister will review how the planning system operates?

One current specific problem is that the process does not adequately address the cumulative energy and climate impact of continued data centre development in Ireland. A typical data centre's energy use contributes approximately 0.5% of Ireland's annual greenhouse gas emissions and this might go into an environmental impact assessment as being insignificant but it is the cumulative impact of these data centres that must be taken into account. They cannot be taken into account on a local basis because climate change is a global matter. We must look at the cumulative national impact.

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I again thank the Senator for her comments. The Government is committed to achieving net zero emissions by 2050, with an annual reduction in overall emissions of 7%. This is a challenge and at the same time an opportunity for the Government, agencies and industry stakeholders to work together to achieve a green Ireland.

I have noted the Senator's questions and will take them back to the Minister. Data centres can form part of integrated energy systems as we move forward, as demonstrated by the recently announced and innovative district heating project in Tallaght using waste heat supplied free of charge from a local data centre. It is estimated that once the project is completed, there will be reduction in carbon dioxide emissions in the south County Dublin area by nearly 1,500 tonnes of CO2 per year.

The climate action plan also contains a number of actions related to this area, including that IDA Ireland will use its new strategy to fully integrate decarbonisation objectives across its portfolio of clients. I will take the questions back to the Minister.