Next stage?
Electricity (Supply) (Amendment) Bill, 1959—Report Stage.
Bill received for final consideration.
We have no business for tomorrow, so we might as well leave it over. I object to its being taken at this stage because I asked the Minister a question and I got a reply from him which was not a reply. May I continue, Sir?
Within reasonable limits.
The point at issue is what generating capacity there is in the country and if we have enough surplus to our requirements. I asked the Minister what the capacity of each station was, what the total capacity was and what has been the greatest draw on the total capacity at the highest point of peak load. I got a reply which was that it had kept to 100 per cent. for some time. That is not an answer to the question I asked. The question related to the total generating capacity and, over the last three years, the total draw at peak load periods. One station might be working to 100 per cent. capacity and others might be lying idle. Perhaps the Minister could direct himself to the point at issue. Have we surplus generating capacity at the moment and if so, what is the necessity to add to it? The Minister may have a reply in the morning for me?
We are discussing nothing now because the only question is when the Fifth Stage will be taken. I allowed the Deputy to put a question, so I shall allow the Minister time to make a short statement.
I thought I had given the Deputy sufficient information to assure him that the amount of spare capacity is sufficient only to deal with the different power demands that arise from time to time. It is almost impossible to make comparisons with other countries because of the different conditions here. The spare capacity of the E.S.B. is regarded as the minimum required to deal with the following series of situations as they arise. We have the almost fantastic situation of an extremely wet year followed by a dry winter in which the hydro-stations are not able to provide the amount of power for the peak winter purposes. At the same time, in certain years there will be insufficient turf production but in the latter part of the year there may again be a dry season which will reduce the winter water power.
With all these varying types of situations and with the peak requirement at certain times of the year roughly from sundown to 11 o'clock, the amount of spare capacity required is, I am advised by the Board, only adequate. Naturally they make allowances for what might be described as emergency conditions. They have to take account between the difference in the position here and in Great Britain where the vast majority of the power is provided by solid fuel or oil and in which hydro-development does not enter into it. It would be much too long an exercise for me, even if I had the figures, to measure the very cheap cost of hydro-generated power as compared with any other type of power, against the interest on capital for the spare capacity required when the hydro-power is inadequate.
The programme of the E.S.B. for the next eight years was put up to us by the E.S.B. It was accepted almost without any amendment whatever. It is their prediction of what is required in the next eight years, based on certain assumptions in regard to the increase of power required by the community—based on the assumption that the increase will be seven per cent. per annum. No pressure is being brought to bear on the E.S.B. to put in more installed capacity for turf or for oil, either with the object of forcing a higher degree of employment on the bogs or in order to suggest that we are moving faster than we really are in the economic life of the country.
The proposals were put forward to us by the Board and were accepted by the Government. The only important consideration is that the Government have for a considerable number of years stressed the necessity for making use of the whole of our available turf resources on bogs which are economically useful. The production of turf varies from year to year. The community may be paying a certain cost arising from the effects of weather upon turf production. Now that Bord na Móna have gone into the production of milled peat which is a very low cost fuel and now that they have been able to experience production over a number of years the arrangement is made that Bord na Móna will reserve about 25 per cent. surplus of peat from one year to the other so as to avoid the kind of excess capacity that might otherwise be necessary if there were not that reserve of peat.
As more and more of the available turf bogs get into production, there will be a higher percentage of power derived from oil. Quite evidently, as the consumption of current increases to reach the point where every bog is being exploited and where the total percentage of power derived from local and oil increases, the excess capacity may be slightly diminished because of the fact that in examining the use of water, oil and peat there is a sufficient amount of oil to prevent an unnecessary amount of spare capacity being required because of the possibility of bad weather on the bogs from one year to another.
Will the Minister answer my question? What is the total capacity of all the generating stations in the country? To what extent, over the last three years, two dry and one wet, is the percentage of total power so drawn upon at peak load times?
I think I have gone far enough to assist the Deputy in his deliberations by giving him the figures of the maximum demand as a percentage of installed capacity for all the stations for the year ending 31st March, 1959, and the year ending 31st March, 1960. At some time, during those years, all the stations were running at full capacity.
For how long in each year?
That would be very complicated.
It would not.
There comes a point when the Deputy should take my word in this matter.
What is Parliament for but to get the truth?
I have given the Deputy all the reasonable information which can be digested by the nontechnical man.
The Minister has technical men from the E.S.B. behind him. Tell me the total generating capacity in the country and, for each of the last three years, what percentage of that capacity was drawn on at the highest point of peak load in each year. Then we shall see what the surplus capacity is.
I do not think I can allow the discussion to go on in this matter.
I can resume tomorrow on the Fifth Stage.
Fifth Stage ordered for Thursday, 24th November, 1960.