Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent)
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438. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources when it is expected to provide a microgeneration REFIT scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36319/13]

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Electric Ireland has been offering a 9c/kwh feed in tariff, on a commercial basis, to domestic microgenerators since February 2009. No other electricity supply company has to date chosen to enter the domestic market and to offer a microgeneration feed-in-tariff on a commercial basis, although the Commission for Energy Regulation invited them to do so. In addition, no company has opted to offer, on a commercial basis, a feed-in-tariff for microgeneration to the commercial and industrial sectors.

Previously, a joint ESB/Electric Ireland microgeneration support scheme for the domestic sector offering a total of 19c/kwh (comprising €10c/kwh from ESB Networks combined with the 9c/kwh from ESB Customer Supply), ran for 3 years from February 2009 to February 2012, and had a take up of between 500 and 600 installations.

In view of falling technology costs, my Department has recently asked the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) to update analysis on the costs of varying levels of support for microgeneration technologies, with a view to considering how the sector could be supported in the future. This analysis will also cover non-tariff support mechanisms, the cost of which would not be funded from the Public Service Obligation.