Matt Shanahan warns of energy crisis, urges biomass power stations
Matt Shanahan challenged the minister on energy security, soaring electricity costs and perceived gaps in green energy policy, arguing businesses and households are being unfairly penalised. He called for reopening Lainsborough and Shannon Bridge power stations fuelled by biomass, reforms to forestry thinning, an application to EU Repower funding, and faster supports for households and SMEs.
Immediate concerns over electricity bills
He quoted the Irish Petrol Retailers Association and a station owner who reported a €23,000 electricity bill for August, saying overnight rates have risen from 7 cents to 37 cents per kilowatt hour and that paying these bills is unsustainable for businesses and families.
Data centres and overnight consumption
He questioned whether data centres are paying the same high overnight rates and cited calls for the Commission for Regulation of Utilities to investigate if businesses and households are being unfairly penalised for overnight usage.
Forestry policy and biomass proposal
He highlighted a perceived disconnect in forestry licensing, saying 80% of licences are for felling rather than planting and that most licences are going to the public sector rather than private growers. He urged reopening Lainsborough and Shannon Bridge power stations to burn biomass and called for legislative change to ease forestry thinning, which he said is currently bogged down by bureaucracy.
Missed RepowerEU funding opportunity
He referenced an Irish Examiner report that the government did not apply to the EU RepowerEU programme and suggested Ireland may have missed an estimated €800 million for biomethane and anaerobic digestion. He also noted the Green Party appears not to have supported pursuing this avenue due to opposition to anaerobic digesters.
Solar power, farm grid access and supports for households and businesses
He argued for easing planning barriers for solar PV and cited new roof membrane technology as an opportunity. He said promised grant aid to farmers is undermined by lack of grid access, limiting surplus generation. He urged more proactive supports ahead of the budget, warned of collapsing business confidence, and cited a large Waterford employer considering closure with a potential loss of about 25 whole-time jobs.
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I'm Margot Cahirlech, and firstly on behalf of the regional group I would like to thank Coyte Niall, our parliamentary assistant, for the work she's done here. Minister, we are in an energy security difficulty and an energy cost crisis. Can I just read something into the record briefly from the Irish Petrol Retailers Association? A station owner, Johnny Brady, at Cool Quay, recently received an electricity bill of €23,000 for the month of August. He says that paying these bills is unsustainable. His electricity cost for the overnight rate has increased from 7 cents per kilowatt hour to 37 cents per kilowatt hour. He says I have nothing against data centres but wind turbines run overnight when the country's usage is at a minimum. Are the data centres also paying 30 cents per kilowatt hour for this overnight usage? He calls for the Commission of Regulations of Utilities to investigate urgently and let the country know that businesses and families are not being penalised unfairly for overnight usage. He also goes into significant verbiage there regarding rates, which is also coming back from local authorities. So there are very significant difficulties facing our business community and our domestic community, Minister, which I know you are aware of. I would question the policy now of government and whether it is reactive and proactive. I suppose specifically what I am thinking in terms of is green policy, Minister. I did reference this in the debate last night, the forestry sector. And we know the green credentials around forestry and that we want to increase forestry, increase carbon sequestration. But at the moment, if you look at where forestry licenses are going, 80% of them are for felling, not for planting. And the most of that are going towards the public sector and not the private sector growers. And this is just one significant disconnect. We have in our motion called for the reopening of Lainsborough and Shannon Bridge, Power Stations Minister, to be fuelled by biomass. But that can only be achieved if we are going to seriously look at the kind of legislation we have for thinning forestries at the moment, which is not happening simply because of the amount of bureaucracy around it. Also today there was an article in the Irish Examiner showing that the government did not in fact make any application to the EU new Repower EU programme, a 35 billion euro programme to try and ensure energy security. And despite that there was a significant component in here that Ireland could apply to under biomethane and anaerobic digestion, 800 million in fact would have probably been our share. It is obvious that the Green Party did not support the government looking to this because I believe you are not a supporter of anaerobic digesters. I think this is a significant deficit in the country, Minister. You can tell me I am wrong, I am sure you probably will. But we did not make the application, Minister, and we left 800 million lying around, it looks like. Solar PV, which has been mentioned also in our motion. Minister, why can we not disregard planning permission for new solar PV? And in fact there is new barrier membranes that have been developed in the Far East that will cover roofs, not solar panels, just actually barrier membranes that can represent and that can generate solar power. And surely this is something we should now become active on. We gave a commitment to the agricultural sector over two years ago that we were going to significantly provide grant aid to farmers for deploying solar power. But again we have no way of getting back to the grid for most farmers, so they can only use it for their own purposes. And this is no good when they have spare power that they could certainly put back into the grid. And finally, Minister, I think again we need to speak about the supports to households and to businesses. And I know that you have signalled or the Taoiseach have signalled that some of these supports will not be ready by the time the budget is approved in less than two weeks. We have to wait and see what the EU are going to come up with. Can we not be more proactive, Minister, I would ask, in terms of trying to provide support? We must give a signal to our domestic economy, to our SMEs as to how are we going to support what is coming down the road. Otherwise people are losing confidence absolutely exponentially and people are looking at their business models. We have had a very large public business in Waterford before the weekend who tell me that they are now considering closing down at the end of September or October because their business is not sustainable and I think for them the best thing they can do is stay closed until February-March last week with the loss of probably nearly 25 whole-time jobs. So, Minister, that would be my contribution to you on this. Go on, good chair. Thank you. Thank you.
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