Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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37. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment to provide an update on the expansion of the offshore wind energy taskforce. [17284/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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The Offshore Wind Delivery Taskforce was established in 2022 to deliver a system-wide plan across Government to accelerate and drive delivery of Ireland’s offshore wind targets and capture the wider and longer term economic and business opportunities associated with the development of offshore renewables. I was pleased to attend the recent Taskforce meeting on the 3rd of April. The Programme for Government commits to expanding the focus of the Offshore Wind Delivery Taskforce to place greater emphasis on attracting and retaining capital investment to drive offshore wind development. It reiterates IDA Ireland’s role within the Taskforce, recognising its important work in those areas.IDA Ireland, along with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and Enterprise Ireland, will continue to play a prominent role within the Offshore Wind Delivery Taskforce in 2025 under an updated Offshore Wind Energy Programme. In addition, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment published ‘Powering Prosperity – Ireland’s Offshore Wind Industrial Strategy’ in 2024. This strategy aims to build a successful, vibrant and impactful offshore wind energy industry in Ireland, ensuring that the sector creates as much value as possible throughout Ireland and maximises the economic benefits associated with delivering Ireland’s ORE ambitions. To achieve this, it contains a number of actions for delivery across various action owners, including IDA Ireland.

Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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38. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the total amount in subsidies that have been paid to support wind farm developments over each year for the past five years; if he plans to make changes to subsidies for the renewable energy sector in the foreseeable future; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [16081/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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The Public Service Obligation (PSO) levy supports the development of renewable electricity including wind, solar, and other renewable technology generation projects and is a key enabler to decarbonising our electricity system over the longer term in line with the Climate Action Plan and the Programme for Government.

The PSO levy is applied to all electricity customers and is collected through electricity suppliers as part of their bills. The money raised from the levy funds renewable electricity generators that qualify for support through various government schemes including the Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS).

An inverse relationship exists between the PSO and wholesale electricity prices, with higher wholesale prices meaning a lower PSO levy and lower wholesale prices leading to an increased PSO levy. In addition, the RESS, provides for consumer protection, whereby supported projects are required to pay back into the PSO when market prices exceed their RESS support price.

The CRU determined a PSO Levy of €251.79 million for the ‘2024/25 PSO Year’. This equates to €3.23 per month per domestic electricity customer and €12.91 for small commercial customers. Customers in the medium/large commercial category are subject to a monthly charge of €1.57/kVA.

The table below details the annual PSO levy for each year over the past five years. It should be noted that the negative figures are years in which the consumer received a net refund from the PSO.