Eamon Scanlon (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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470. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment if the public electric vehicle charging point in Manorhamilton, County Leitrim will be reinstated; the reason the charging point at Collooney railway station and the charging points in Carrick-on-Shannon, County Leitrim are permanently out of order; his plans to rectify the situation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8264/18]

Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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The ESB, through its eCars programme, has rolled out both publicly accessible charging infrastructure and domestic charge points for electric vehicles. There are approximately 900 EV charge points in Ireland of which circa 70 are rapid chargers. The maintenance of eCar charge points is an operational matter for the ESB. I have asked that the eCars team contact the Deputy directly in relation to the charge points highlighted.

A map showing all public charge points in Ireland, including the status and availability of the charge points, is available on the ESB’s website at www.esb.ie/ecars. There is also the ‘ecar connect’ app enables users to locate charge points in Ireland, locate the nearest charge point and to help them to plan their route using the installed infrastructure around the country.

In March 2014, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities approved an application from ESB Networks to recover the costs of a pilot project to a maximum of €25 million from use of system charges to cover the rollout of this infrastructure. Following a public consultation process, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities published its independent regulatory decision in relation to the ownership of this infrastructure in October 2017. A key outcome of the decision is that the charging network should not form part of the regulated asset base and therefore expansions of the network should not be funded from network charges. This is in keeping with the proposals set out by the European Commission in the Clean Energy for All Europeans package which was published in 2016.

The Commission for Regulation of Utilities also envisages the future sale of the infrastructure by ESB Networks. However, the continued ownership of the charging network by ESB Networks for a transitional period of up to ten years is provided for. This ensures no short to medium term impact on the electric vehicle charging infrastructure and allows the ESB to continue to provide electric vehicle charging across Ireland.

The decision also set out the need for the electric vehicle charging infrastructure to operate on a commercial basis. In the absence of State-led support, this is unlikely to happen in the near term.  Funding has been allocated in my Department's budget this year to support the provision of public charging, with a particular focus on increasing the number of rapid chargers on key national routes.  

The Low Emissions Vehicle Taskforce, which is co-chaired by my Department and the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport, is considering a range of measures and options available to Government to accelerate the deployment of electric vehicles. A key focus of the work of the Taskforce is examining options for infrastructure, regulation and pricing in order to devise a sustainable policy framework for effective and efficient electric vehicle charging.  This includes examining options for the provision of public charging.