Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein)
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196. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government the percentage of Ireland's electricity that is imported; and the cost to import this electricity, in each of the years 2020 to date, in tabular form. [41359/26]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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Electricity interconnection plays a central role in Ireland’s journey to decarbonisation. Ireland’s interconnection ambitions are well set out in the National Policy Statement on Electricity Interconnection published in 2023 (www.gov.ie/en/publication/3d96f-national-policy-statement-on-electricity-connection-2023/).

As a small island market, Ireland should benefit significantly from stronger links to a larger European electricity network. Interconnectors improve energy security, support renewable integration and enable electricity imports when domestic renewable output is low and exports when renewable generation is high. This will become increasingly important as Ireland expands its offshore renewable energy capacity.

Each proposed interconnector is assessed by the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities to help ensure net positive benefit from its operation. Higher interconnection capacity can deliver positive socio-economic benefits, reduce renewable curtailment, reduce national emissions, improve system flexibility, enable management of a variable renewable electricity system and allow for lower reliance on fossil-fuel backup generation.

In 2024, 14% of Ireland's gross supply of electricity came from net-imports across interconnectors, including 7.4% across the East-West interconnector from Britain, and 6.6% across the North-South interconnector from Northern Ireland. Electricity supply from the net import of electricity across interconnectors in 2024 was 1.8 TWh higher than in 2023.

The recently published SEAI Interim Energy Balance report for 2025 notes that Ireland imported 16.3% of its electricity supply in 2025 www.seai.ie/data-and-insights/seai-statistics/key-publications/national-energy-balance.

The CSO collates data around electricity imports and exports including around costs overall. Detailed monthly statistics are available on the Central Statistics Office website /data.cso.ie/table/TSM06.

However, it should be noted that the import of electricity to meet demand only occurs when the imported electricity is cheaper than the alternative generation source (usually gas-fired generation) that would be required to meet demand in that time period.

The increasing number of interconnectors between the continent, Britain and Ireland is enabling greater sharing of solar, onshore and offshore wind as weather patterns move across North-West Europe. This increasing interconnection is reducing emissions, prices and improving security of supply across all the interconnected countries.