Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein)
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43. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government to report on SRESS 1; the number of projects which were successful in their applications; to report on their progress; when he anticipates they will be energised; when he anticipates SRESS 2 will take place; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [55779/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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The Programme for Government commits to promoting the Small-Scale Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (SRESS) to simplify market access for community, SME and farmer-owned solar and wind projects.

The first phase of SRESS was launched in July 2023, which, along with the Microgeneration Support Scheme (MSS), provides non-domestic grants support for renewables self-consumers to invest in systems of up to 1MW in size. Renewables self-consumers are electricity customers that produce renewable electricity for their own use. They are also legally entitled to sell any excess electricity to their electricity supplier, or else store it for their own use.

The SRESS export phase (SRESS 1) is designed for community, SME and farmer export only projects above 50kW to 6MW. SRESS offers a simpler route to market for those groups, with fixed tariffs for solar and wind, aligning more closely to the capacity of those sectors. All export projects up to 1MW can also apply to SRESS, and need not be community, SME and farmer owned projects.

The scheme opened for applications in January. The SRESS application form together with the terms and conditions, a non-technical summary and first steps guides for exporters and for renewable self-consumers are available on the Department’s website at www.gov.ie/SRESS

Five SME and five community applications have been accepted into the scheme. My Department is also processing additional SME and community applications that have been received.

The SME projects have until 2029 to energise while the community projects have until 2030. However, it is expected that these projects will energise in advance of these dates, as they will not receive any SRESS tariff before that.

There are currently no plans for an SRESS 2 as SRESS 1 is still open with adequate available capacity still left in the scheme.