Clare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent)
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243. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources further to Parliamentary Question No. 855 of 27 September 2016 (details supplied), if he will introduce legislation to compel electricity suppliers to provide a tariff to generators of renewable energy; if his attention has been drawn to the fact that this has led to the success of renewable energy supplies in Germany and other countries; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29117/16]

Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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Ireland's electricity market is commercial, competitive, liberalised and regulated in accordance with frameworks set out in EU and national legislation.  The regulation of the market is the responsibility of the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER) which is an independent statutory based regulator and I have no function in the matter. Accordingly, in a liberalised market I have no plans to introduce legislation on this matter.

On the question of a tariff payment for energy exported to the grid from micro-generation, as I have previously stated in the House, other than Electric Ireland, to date no other electricity supplier has chosen to provide such a tariff, to either domestic or commercial customers, although they have been invited to do so by the CER. Any decision by an electricity supplier to offer a tariff payment is a commercial decision for the company.

The Energy White Paper published last December sets out a high-level framework for Ireland's energy transition to a low carbon economy and society and identifies a range of measures and actions to support this aim. Exploring the scope to provide support for renewable micro-generation will form part of my Department’s on-going analysis to underpin the introduction of a new Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS).

In-depth analysis is now underway to inform the actual costings of a new Scheme. While no decision has been taken on the precise renewable technologies to be supported, the cost and technical viability of a range of renewable technologies is being assessed, including, for example, micro-generation. As regards the design of the scheme, options ranging from the payment of support tariffs to up-front grants to deploy renewable energy for self-consumption are under consideration.