Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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118. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment for the breakdown of the funding provided for community energy grants in 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42529/24]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The Communities Energy Grant Scheme is part of the Government's National Retrofit Programme. The primary objective of the scheme is to support and maximise the number of home energy upgrades delivered. Non-domestic projects are also supported to encourage broader community engagement and mobilisation.

Other objectives include:

• Building capacity working with project co-ordinators on large-scale and complex projects
• Supporting cross-sectoral, partnership approaches targeting public, private, commercial and community buildings
• Encouraging the retrofitting of rental properties
• Helping develop the retrofit supply chain
• Building relationships with communities and businesses
• Developing community project management capacity

• 2023: €27m
• 2022: €17.3m
• 2021: €21.8m
• 2020: €18.7m

• Support for projects focused solely on residential upgrades;
• Improved supports to address the particular challenge of retrofitting Multi-Unit Developments such as flat complexes, including scaffolding and communal areas, and,
• A pilot focused on area-based home retrofit projects which will encourage CEG Project Coordinators, Local Authorities and local energy agencies to collaborate with an ethos of leaving no home behind.

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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119. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment for the breakdown of the funding provided for domestic solar photovoltaic systems in 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42530/24]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS) was approved by Government on 21 December 2021, to support Ireland’s ambitious targets for micro-generation installations, under the Climate Action Plan. The MSS provides supports to both domestic and non-domestic applicants, in the form of grants for Solar PV installations, up to a maximum of €2,100 in 2024 for Domestic installations. These are available through the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI).

The SEAI maintains data regarding the financing and functioning of the Domestic Solar PV scheme and the previous pilot scheme it replaced in 2022 and has facilitated the information in response to your question. Past allocations of capital and current funding to the SEAI in respect of the Domestic Solar PV scheme are as follows:The Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS) was approved by Government on 21 December 2021, to support Ireland’s ambitious targets for micro-generation installations, under the Climate Action Plan. The MSS provides supports to both domestic and non-domestic applicants, in the form of grants for Solar PV installations, up to a maximum of €2,100 in 2024 for Domestic installations. These are available through the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI).

The SEAI maintains data regarding the financing and functioning of the Domestic Solar PV scheme and the previous pilot scheme it replaced in 2022 and has facilitated the information in response to your question. Past allocations of capital and current funding to the SEAI in respect of the Domestic Solar PV sc

Due to the success of this scheme and resultant high grant uptake levels, the initial capital allocations in 2020, 2022 and 2023 were exceeded, requiring the provision of additional funds, bringing the total supports provided to:

It is also projected that the total capital funding requirement for 2024 will amount to €67.3m. These funds have been made available by my Department, who are also currently conducting discussions with the relevant stakeholders on resources that will be required in 2025.

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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120. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment for a breakdown of the funding provided for community solar photovoltaic systems in 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42535/24]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The Programme for Government committed to the development of a Solar Energy Strategy for rooftop and ground-based photovoltaics to ensure that a greater share of our electricity needs is met through solar power.

The Renewable Energy Support Scheme (RESS) Community Enabling Framework was launched in 2022. It provides a range of supports, including grant funding of potentially up to €180,000, offered from SEAI to community renewable energy projects, to help them participate in the RESS. To date, two community projects (both under RESS 1 in 2022), including one solar and one wind, have received €40,000 each in grant funding.

My Department is working closely with the SEAI and community groups to assess the barriers to community energy projects, to ensure a long term sustainable future for the community energy sector in Ireland. In that regard, community projects will now transition to the non-competitive Small-Scale Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (SRESS), enabling community projects to maximise their participation in the energy transition.

The first phase of SRESS was launched in July 2023. This sees both SRESS and the Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS) providing support to communities, larger businesses, farms, and public buildings, with grants that support solar installations for self-consumption. These non-domestic scheme grants are supporting renewables self-consumers to invest in systems of up to 1MW in size. A total of 1,923 grants applications have been received, including, for the Community and Sports Sector 103 grant applications amounting to funding of €910,109 and a total installation capacity of over 7.7 MW.

The export project tariff phase of SRESS, is due to open for applications by the end of the year, and will be a major step forward in supporting the community energy sector and a key building block in delivering on the solar strategy.