Written answers

Thursday, 12 March 2015

Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources

Energy Efficiency

Photo of Seán KyneSeán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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41. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources the progress on the introduction of a pay-as-you-save system for financing energy efficient upgrades; the number of times the project teams established for this purpose has met and which Departments or departmental sectors are represented on the team. [10228/15]

Photo of Joe McHughJoe McHugh (Donegal North East, Fine Gael)
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The development of a Better Energy Finance (BEF) scheme arises from a Programme for Government commitment to transition from Exchequer funded grants for energy efficiency measures to a market orientated approach to delivering energy efficiency savings.

To achieve this, a BEF project team was established in December 2012 under the aegis of the Department. The team consisted of representatives seconded on a full time basis from energy suppliers, the finance community and the retrofit industry, with the objective of developing proposals on how a BEF scheme might operate. The team met on an ongoing basis from December 2012 to November 2013. The project was overseen by a Steering Committee which met 12 times during 2013. Following the completion by the project team of its work, the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) was tasked with drawing up a detailed implementation plan for the design, development and execution of the scheme. In that context, meetings between the SEAI and the Department continued during 2014.

This year €2 million in Exchequer funding has been made available under the Better Energy Communities Scheme to pilot and evaluate innovative financing schemes in a community setting. The Better Energy Communities Scheme is application led, with a closing date of 20 March 2015. Applications will be evaluated and projects selected on a competitive basis. A further €1 million has been made available to fund other trials and measures on BEF. These trials are being administered by the SEAI.

The results of these trials will inform the final design of the BEF Scheme, as will evidence from some schemes in operation internationally. However, it is important to note that pay-as-you-save type schemes are relatively new in the countries where they exist. Other countries tend to have multiple financial incentives in place, predominantly grant based, to underpin residential retrofit programmes.

The work carried out to date in Ireland suggests that there is an understandable reluctance for households to take on additional debt and the success of a BEF Scheme would, therefore, require a compelling consumer proposition with accompanying incentives to capture consumer interest and drive action. It is likely that this would require a combination of some Exchequer funded grants and a consumer financing offering.

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