Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands debate -
Wednesday, 6 Dec 2023

Water and Energy Connections in Rural Areas: Discussion

An Cathaoirleach

I apologise but I must leave at 11 a.m. The witnesses can thank their colleagues because the Women's Infrastructure Network is having its first chapter meeting in Ireland today and I have been asked to speak at it. They are getting off the hook because of that, so they should thank them for that.

Members are required to participate in the meeting remotely from within the Leinster House complex only. I remind all those in attendance to ensure their mobile phones are switched off or on silent mode.

I welcome the witnesses who are protected by absolute privilege in respect of the presentations they make to the committee. This means they have an absolute defence against any defamation action for anything they say at the meeting. However, they are expected not to abuse this privilege and it is my duty, as Cathaoirleach, to ensure this privilege is not abused. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction. Witnesses are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against any person or entity either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that might be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity.

Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person or entity outside the Houses or an official either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

The committee will now consider utility connections in rural areas and on our islands. In a recent historic meeting of this joint committee ar Árainn Mhór, it was demonstrated very clearly to us the impact of water and electricity connections in rural areas and the difficulties often for those in remote areas and on our offshore islands.

There are brilliant strides being made on connectivity and with the utility connections in place it will be possible for the islands to become climate neutral and a net provider of energy to the mainland. However, in order to realise these aims, it is essential utilities are available and regularly serviced to ensure the island population is able to live, work and thrive on our offshore islands into the future.

From the Department of Rural and Community Development, I welcome Mr. Robert Nicholson, principal officer at the rural strategy and social enterprise unit, and Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle, principal officer at the islands unit. From the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications I welcome Mr. John Finnegan, principal officer and Mr. Brian Diskin, assistant principal officer. From the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities, I welcome Mr. Jim Gannon, chairperson, Ms Aoife MacEvilly, commissioner, and Mr. Conor McEvoy, electricity networks manager. From ESB Networks we have Mr. Nicholas Tarrant, managing director, and Mr. Alan Rossiter, manager of customer and project delivery south. From Uisce Éireann we have Mr. Ted O'Reilly, asset planning manager, Mr. Des Joyce, water supply lead and Mr. Anthony Skeffington, regional operations manager. All are very welcome.

I invite Mr. Mac an Mhíle to make his opening statement.

Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle

Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. Ba mhaith liom buíochas a ghabháil leis an gcoiste as an deis labhartha leis ar maidin. In éineacht liom inniu, mar a dúirt an Cathaoirleach, tá mo chomhghleacaí, Robert Nicholson, príomhoifigeach san aonad um straitéis tuaithe agus fiontraíocht shóisialta. Tuigim gur reáchtáladh cruinniú den choiste seo ar Oileán Árainn Mhór le déanaí agus, dá réir, fáiltím roimh an deis nuashonrú a dhéanamh don gcoiste ar obair na Roinne i gcomhthéacs Ár nOileáin Bheo, polasaí náisiúnta na n-oileán agus plean gníomhaíochta ina leith, a sheol an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, ar Árainn Mhór i mí Mheithimh na bliana seo.

Beidh a fhios ag an choiste gur aistríodh cúram na n-oileán chuig an Roinn Forbartha Tuaithe agus Pobail díreach os cionn trí bliana ó shin, i mí Mheán Fómhair 2020. Tá formhór foirne rannóg na n-oileán lonnaithe in oifigí i nGaeltacht Chonamara sna Forbacha agus le baill foirne i nDoirí Beaga, Contae Dhún na nGall agus ag ceannáras na Roinne anseo i mBaile Átha Cliath. Is trí mheán na Gaeilge go príomha a fheidhmíonn an rannóg ar bhonn laethúil, agus cuirimid seirbhís dhátheangach ar fáil do na hoileáin Ghaeltachta agus neamh-Ghaeltachta araon.

Is polasaí náisiúnta, uaillmhianach, deich mbliana é Ár nOileáin Bheo a cuireadh le chéile chun tacú le pobail bhríomhara inbhuanaithe ar na hoileáin. Beidh pleananna gníomhaíochta trí bliana mar thaca le cur i bhfeidhm an pholasaí, le gealltanais faoi cheangal ama ionas gur féidir Ranna agus gníomhaireachtaí ar fud an Rialtais a choinneáil cuntasach. Áirítear orthu sin fíorghníomhaíochtaí inbhraite i réimsí amhail tithíocht, nascacht, cianobair agus seirbhísí sláinte.

Tá ár gcuid oileán amach ón gcósta agus a gcuid pobal ina ndlúthchuid den tuath in Éirinn, mar a léirítear in Ár dTodhchaí Tuaithe, Polasaí Forbartha Tuaithe na hÉireann 2021-2025. Dá réir, baineann cur i gcrích an pholasaí seo leis na prionsabail chéanna atá in Ár dTodhchaí Tuaithe agus muid ag obair inár gcuid iarrachtaí chun na hoileáin go léir a chuimsiú chun deiseanna agus rannpháirtíocht chomhionann a bheith ag gach pobal sa tsochaí, beag beann ar a láthair.

Tá Ár nOileáin Bheo bunaithe ar chúig chuspóir straitéiseacha ardleibhéil atá aitheanta ag muintir na n-oileán féin mar chinn ríthábhachtacha do thodhchaí inbhuanaithe a bpobal. Forbraíodh an polasaí trí phróiseas fairsing comhairliúcháin le pobail na n-oileán. Tá sé mar aidhm leis a chinntiú gur féidir le pobail inbhuanaithe bheoga leanúint orthu ag caitheamh a saoil, agus iad faoi bhláth, ar na hoileáin amach ón gcósta ar feadh na mblianta fada. Tá sé mar aidhm ag an bpolasaí stop a chur leis an meath daonra atá feicthe ar fhormhór na n-oileán agus todhchaí inbhuanaithe a chruthú do phobail na n-oileán agus iad a chumasú i bhforbairt a bpobal féin. Bainfear na torthaí seo amach le cur i bhfeidhm an pholasaí trí: níos mó daoine a bheith ina gcónaí ar na hoileáin; níos mó daoine a bheith ag obair ar na hoileáin; na hoileáin ag cur leis, agus baint tairbhe as, an aistriú chuig geilleagar ísealcharbóin agus sochaí aeráidneodrach; agus ról gníomhach a bheith ag pobail na n-oileán maidir lena dtodhchaí féin a chruthú.

Ónár gcomhairliúchán leis an bpobal, is léir gurb é an chúis is mó a fhágann daoine na h-oileáin ná fostaíocht ar ardchaighdeáin a lorg. Tá deis ar leith againn anois an treocht sin a aisiompú. Is athrú mór do na hoileáin é an chianobair. Mar is eol don choiste, le leathanbhanda ardluais, is féidir anois an post céanna a dhéanamh ar na hoileáin amach ón gcósta agus anseo i gcathair Bhaile Átha Cliath.

Má tá níos mó daoine le bheith ag obair ar na hoileáin, ní mór dúinn a chinntiú go bhfuil áit chónaithe acu. Ba ábhair mhóra imní iad tithíocht agus pleanáil do phobail na n-oileán le linn an phróisis chomhairliúcháin. Sna seachtainí sular tugadh an polasaí chun críche, d’oibrigh an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, go dlúth lena comhghleacaí Rialtais, an tAire, an Teachta O’Brien, ar na ceisteanna seo, mar is ar an Roinn Tithíochta, Rialtais Áitiúil agus Oidhreachta agus ar na húdaráis áitiúla atá an fhreagracht as tithíocht agus pleanáil araon. Fuair an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, gealltanas láidir ón Aire, an Teachta O’Brien, go dtabharfaí aitheantas sna dréacht-treoirlínte pleanála do thithíocht tuaithe atá le teacht ar na dúshláin shonracha atá roimh phobail na n-oileán.

Tarraingíodh aird tríd an bpróiseas comhairliúcháin ar líon na n-áitreabh folamh nó tréigthe ar na hoileáin. Mar fhreagra air sin, d’fhógair an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, i mí an Mheithimh go gcuirfeadh an Roinn seo íocaíocht bhreise 20% ar fáil faoin deontas athchóirithe do réadmhaoin fholamh, nó Croí Cónaithe, go sonrach chun tacú leis na hoileánaigh ar mian leo tithe folmha agus tréigthe ar na hoileáin a thabhairt ar ais mar chóiríocht chónaithe fhadtéarmach.

Aithnítear sa pholasaí gur gá réitigh fhadtéarmacha a aimsiú chun freastal ar riachtanais soláthair uisce na n-oileán. Áirítear sa phlean gníomhaíochta bearta ina leith seo atá le cur i gcrích ag Uisce Éireann agus na húdaráis áitiúla ábhartha, mar go bhfuil freagracht orthu i leith seirbhísí uisce.

Tá deis ar leith ag na hoileáin páirt a ghlacadh san aistriú chuig fuinneamh in-athnuaite agus tairbhe a bhaint as, agus go leor acu ag glacadh páirte sa tionscnamh, Fuinneamh Glan d'Oileáin an Aontais Eorpaigh. Tagann an tionscnamh seo faoi chúram na Roinne Comhshaoil, Aeráide agus Cumarsáide atá freagrach as polasaí fuinnimh don tír ar fad.

Mar is eol don choiste, is é rochtain idir na hoileáin agus an mhórthír an riachtanas is bunúsaí dóibh siúd atá ina gcónaí ar na hoileáin amach ón gcósta, agus is líne tharrthála é do phobail na n-oileán. Bíonn tionchar ag rochtain ar gach gné de shaol na n-oileán, lena n-áirítear seirbhísí sláinte agus leasa, oideachas, fostaíocht, saol sóisialta agus an teaghlaigh, agus gnó. Tá nascacht fhisiciúil leis an mórthír ag brath ar chalafoirt shábháilte a bheith ar fáil ar na hoileáin agus ar an mórthír araon. Cuireadh feabhas suntasach ar roinnt céanna thar na blianta trí infheistíocht Stáit i dtionscadail mhóra tógála, ach tá gá le hobair ar chéanna eile sna blianta amach romhainn. Léirítear in Ár nOileáin Bheo an tiomantas d’infheistíocht leanúnach i gcéanna a fhreastalaíonn ar na hoileáin leis na mórthionscadail tosaíochta infreastruchtúir a mhaoinítear tríd an bplean forbartha náisiúnta. Áirítear leis seo forbairt na gcéanna ar Inis Oírr agus ar Inis Meáin, Contae na Gaillimhe, agus ag Machaire Rabhartaigh, Contae Dhún na nGall, a dhéanann freastal ar Thoraigh.

Ina theannta sin, leanfaidh an Roinn leis an leithdháileadh oileáin ag maoiniú clár bliantúil mionoibreacha caipitil ar na hoileáin i gcomhar leis na húdaráis áitiúla. Áirítear leis an gclár oibre sin, i measc go leor oibreacha eile, infheistíocht i gcéanna agus deisiúcháin ar shleamhnáin. Chomh maith le céanna, déantar maoiniú suntasach a infheistiú i mbóithre ar oileáin. D’fhógair an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, i mí an Mheithimh go mbeadh cistiú imfhálaithe, nach féidir a úsáid ach ar na hoileáin, mar chuid de scéim feabhsúcháin áitiúil na Roinne as seo amach. Cuireadh leithdháileadh tosaigh €550,000 ar fáil do bhóithre ar oileáin faoin scéim in 2023.

Tar éis don Stát aerfort Chonamara a cheannach beagnach ceithre bliana ó shin, tá infheistíocht shuntasach déanta ag an Roinn chun na háiseanna a thabhairt suas go caighdeán. Chomh maith leis sin, táimid ag infheistiú sna haerfoirt ar na trí oileán Árann.

Más mian linn ár n-oileáin a dhéanamh níos tarraingtí chun teaghlach a thógáil ann, ní mór dúinn infheistíocht a dhéanamh freisin inár gcuid áiseanna áitiúla, rud a chiallaíonn go mbeidh níos mó maoinithe ar fáil do chlóis súgartha, d’áiseanna spóirt, do chosáin siúil agus rothaíochta agus d’ionaid phobail. Rómhinic, áfach, is féidir le pobail na n-oileán a bheith in iomaíocht le hiarratais ón mórthír agus, ag brath ar an údarás áitiúil, d’fhéadfadh sé nach n-éireodh le hiarratais ón oileán. Ar an gcúis sin as seo amach, beidh allúntais imfhálaithe ar leith, go sonrach d’iarratais ó phobail na n-oileán, ag príomhscéimeanna maoinithe na Roinne seo ar nós CLÁR, LIS, agus an scéim athnuachana bailte agus sráidbhailte.

Faoi Ár nOileáin Bheo, is mian linn cumhacht a thabhairt do phobail na n-oileán ról gníomhach a bheith acu i gcinntí a théann i bhfeidhm ar a dtodhchaí. Tá gealltanas tugtha ag an Roinn seo maoiniú a chur ar fáil do phobail na n-oileán chun pleananna forbartha comhtháite a fhorbairt do ghrúpaí oileán, ag cur san áireamh a gcuid tosaíochtaí féin chun pobail inbhuanaithe a chothú. Is beartas uile-Rialtais é Ár nOileán Beo agus tá aitheantas tugtha ag an Aire don chomhoibriú agus don tacaíocht ó chomhghleacaithe i Ranna Rialtais eile as a gcuid saineolais agus rannpháirtíochta leis an bpolasaí a fhorbairt. Faoi mar a d’aontaigh an Rialtas agus an polasaí á cheadú, cuirfear maoiniú ar fáil chun na gealltanais atá sa pholasaí agus sa phlean gníomhaíochta a chomhlíonadh trí bhuiséid na Ranna Rialtais, na ngníomhaireachtaí agus na gcomhlachtaí Stáit atá freagrach as na gníomhaíochtaí agus na bearta polasaí ábhartha a chur i gcrích. Tá sé seo ag teacht leis an gcur chuige a d’aontaigh an Rialtas i leith Ár dTodhchaí Tuaithe.

Tá súil agam go bhfuil léargas tugtha agam don choiste ar Ár nOileáin Bheo agus ar obair na Roinne chun tacú le pobail na n-oileán, atá mar chuid lárnach den tuath in Éirinn. Tá mé féin agus mo chomhghleacaí, Robert Nicholson, anseo sásta ceisteanna a bheidh ag comhaltaí an choiste a fhreagairt.

An Cathaoirleach

I now invite Mr. Finnegan to make his opening statement.

Mr. John Finnegan

I am the principal officer responsible for hydrogen policy, electricity networks and systems in the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications. I will use these opening remarks to address the topic of renewable energy generation and in particular the availability of grid infrastructure to feed renewable electricity generated in community projects back to electricity users in general, because the committee has indicated that this is the main topic it would like to discuss with the Department.

Under the Climate Action Plan 2023, the Government has set an ambitious target of having an 80% share of electricity generation capacity coming from renewable sources by 2030. In this context, a key priority is enabling citizen and community participation in the energy transition across the country, including in our rural communities including our offshore islands. This will be achieved through a combination of Government support schemes and policies to encourage and subsidise the generation of renewable electricity as well as corporate power purchase agreements and private wires.

One of the major Government policies to help to deliver on Ireland’s ambitious climate and energy targets is the renewable electricity support scheme, RESS, an auction-based support scheme which invites grid-scale renewable electricity generation projects to compete to receive a guaranteed price for the electricity they generate. More than 1 GW of new wind and 1.8 GW of new solar generation was secured in the first two RESS auctions and Ireland is on track to reach 6 GW of grid-connected renewables by the end of 2023. In October, the Minister, Deputy Éamon Ryan, announced the results of the third onshore RESS auction. The successful projects, mostly solar PV projects, represent a 12% increase in Ireland’s renewable energy capacity from current levels.

A core aspect of the RESS is the provision of pathways for communities to participate in renewable electricity generation. The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, has developed a community enabling framework. This is a suite of complementary resources to support communities to develop their own projects.

First, there is an information hub. SEAI has developed a number of useful resources and guides that are the first reference point for any community group. This toolkit of guides contains information on grid connection, the planning process, solar PV, onshore wind, the electricity system, project finance, community groups and governance, stakeholder and community engagement and business planning and procurement.

Second, there are trusted advisers. SEAI specialist technical experts are available to community groups to guide them on every step of their project, from forming a community group, through to site identification, feasibility studies, designing a project, making grids and planning applications.

Third, there is financial support. SEAI can provide grants for early, mid and late-stage development costs to help projects to realise their ambitions. Grants are available to support project design and planning, grid connection, submission costs and advice for project financing.

A further scheme operated by the Department is the microgeneration support scheme, MSS. This provides support to domestic and non-domestic applicants for renewable installations up to 50 KW, in the form of grants provided through the SEAI. It aims to support 380 MW of new microgeneration capacity by 2030. This amounts to some 60,000 homes and 9,000 non-domestic installations, such as small farms and businesses, schools, and community groups.

The latest scheme that is forthcoming is the small-scale renewable electricity support scheme, SRESS. This will offer supports for renewable electricity installations which are not as suited to other support measures, such as the utility scale RESS and the MSS. It will also be a simpler route to market for community projects under 6 MW than the competitive RESS auction process.

I should mention offshore wind. Ireland has now moved to a plan-led approach to deliver our offshore wind targets. This means that all future offshore renewable energy developments and associated grid connections will be determined through the national spatial strategy, which is due to be published by the end of the year, as well as the future framework policy and the offshore transmission strategy, both of which are due to be published in the first quarter of next year.

Moving to the electricity network, the transformation required to meet the up to 80% renewable electricity target by 2030 will require significant investment in the electricity grid. In 2020, CRU, the energy regulator responsible for the oversight of national electricity grid costs, sanctioned a €4 billion capital investment spend on the grid over the 2021 to 2025 five-year period from 2021 to 2025. EirGrid and ESB Networks are using these funds to accommodate the high level of renewables being added to the system, as well as the increased demands from the electrification of our heat and transport sectors.

In July of this year, EirGrid published an updated version of Shaping Our Electricity Future, which is a plan-led approach to deliver an electricity system to meet Ireland’s climate action targets and carbon budgets while allowing for electricity demand growth. Implementing this requires changes at transmission levels, which will see over 350 projects undertaken, contributing also to improved energy security.

In January 2023, ESB Networks published their Networks for Net Zero strategy, which outlines its commitment to future-proofing Ireland’s electricity network, meeting our 2030 goals, and making the country’s goal of net zero by 2050 a reality. Having incorporated system flexibility, to include flexible demand, generation and storage, into their published plans, the Irish system operators, EirGrid and ESB Networks, will be able to increase network efficiency, resilience, and their ability to integrate variable renewable energy sources, while reducing the need for new infrastructure.

In particular, new and enhanced grid connections are provided in response to new investments in renewable generation. The CRU's enduring connection programme sets out the framework for providing these connections to new generation projects. This programme provides for 115 connections applications to be processed by ESB Networks and EirGrid each year from 2021 to 2023. At least 15 of these applications are reserved for community projects. Further applications up to a total of 30 are reserved for microprojects with a maximum capacity of less than 500 KW or self-supply projects.

We understand that the members of the committee are anxious to ensure the grid will be upgraded as necessary to allow electricity to be exported from the islands to the mainland. The intention of the enduring connection programme is that the grid will be upgraded as and when needed to facilitate renewable generation on the islands, or indeed anywhere where there is potential for renewable power. I thank the committee for inviting the Department to attend. I am happy to answer any questions.

An Cathaoirleach

I now invite Mr. Gannon to make his opening statement.

Mr. Jim Gannon

I thank the committee for inviting us to join it today. We are here to discuss utility connections to rural areas and offshore islands. As we have not previously addressed this committee, I might start with a brief outline of our role. The Commission for Regulation of Utilities, CRU, is an independent economic and safety regulator. Our mission is to protect the public interest in water, energy and energy safety. Our vision is to provide safe, secure and sustainable supplies of energy and water, for the benefit of customers, now and in the future.

In line with our current strategic plan, which runs from 2022 to 2024, our four key priorities are to ensure security of supply, drive a low-carbon future, empower and protect consumers, and enable our people and organisational capacity. We have a wide and expanding range of statutory functions, including to regulate some of the key utility companies in Ireland. Under the Electricity Regulation Act 1999, we regulate the activities of the electricity distribution network operator, ESB Networks. Under the Water Services Acts, as amended, we have a similar role in respect of Uisce Éireann.

One of the key elements of the CRU’s work is to implement five-year revenue control programmes for the utility network providers under our remit. The purpose of revenue control processes is to set allowed revenues; in other words, the amount of money allocated to the respective companies to cover their capital and operational expenditure over a five-year period. In this process, the CRU also examines the cost and performance of the companies over the previous five years. In setting the allowed revenues, the CRU has regard to protecting customers and ensuring fair tariffs and charges; ensuring the network companies can finance their undertakings and deliver improved services; setting efficiency targets, reporting requirements and incentives to ensure delivery of high-quality, efficient outcomes for customers; and ensuring the companies have sufficient revenue to enable them to deliver secure supplies and meet national priorities, including climate and environmental obligations.

Turning first to ESB Networks, in the fifth price review, PR5, the CRU decision on revenues for the 2021 to 2025 period provided access to the funds necessary to deliver the climate action plan. It included an electricity networks capital investment programme of €4 billion in total.

It placed very strong incentives on ESB Networks to facilitate the transition to a low-carbon future and better service for customers. It also provided, for the first time, an agile investment framework to allow for flexible and innovative approaches to the changing needs of the system and the policy underpinning it. Specifically for ESB Networks, the PR5 decision provided a step change in revenue including a 20% increase in operational expenditure and an 84% increase in gross capital expenditure to a total of €2.8 billion.

As part of the reporting and incentives framework, ESB Networks reports annually to the CRU on the delivery of its capital expenditure programme, including connections. The link to the latest report is attached to our opening statement for Oireachtas committee members.

Turning now to Uisce Éireann, the CRU’s revenue control 3, RC3, process was the first five-year revenue control for Uisce Éireann, following two shorter revenue control periods from the outset of the CRU’s regulatory role. It should be noted that there is a different process with regard to water, given that the Government provides Exchequer funding to Uisce Éireann. This process includes the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage publishing a water services policy statement, following which Uisce Éireann submits a strategic funding plan to the Minister that sets out the arrangements Uisce Éireann proposes in order to implement the objectives of the water services policy statement.

The Exchequer funding allocations set out in the strategic funding plan reflect the upper ceiling that would be provided by the Exchequer to fund Uisce Éireann operations and investments, with final funding allocations being confirmed based on the CRU revenue control process.

The CRU RC3 decision again provided for a step change in capital investment by Uisce Éireann in water and wastewater services, totalling over €4.5 billion in capital expenditure over the five-year period to deliver significantly improved customer and environmental outcomes.

The CRU publishes an annual investment plan monitoring report setting out the progress made against the RC3 investment plan across the previous year. To date, two such reports have been published covering 2020 and 2021, and are available on the CRU website. It should be noted that the CRU monitors and reports on the delivery of major projects and programmes at a national rather than a granular, regional or local level. As part of this monitoring, the CRU seeks input from a range of stakeholders, including communities, on the work undertaken by ESB Networks on stakeholder engagement in particular, and support for same.

In addition to revenue controls, the CRU is also actively engaged in a number of major projects and programmes to support active customers and citizen and renewable energy communities. I thank the committee and welcome any questions.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

Gabhaim buíochas as an gcuireadh chuig cruinniú an lae inniu. Tá brón orm ach níl a lán Gaeilge agam agus, mar sin, labhróidh mé leis an gcomhchoiste as Béarla, lena thoil.

I thank the Cathaoirleach and members of the committee for the invitation to today’s meeting. My name is Nicholas Tarrant, and I am the managing director of ESB Networks. I am joined by my colleague Alan Rossiter, who is responsible for three of our six regions across Ireland and is heavily involved in the delivery of connections as part of our wider programme of work. We welcome the opportunity to speak to the committee today on electricity infrastructure, and the key role that ESB Networks plays in the connection of both housing and renewable connections. I am going to briefly introduce ESB Networks and cover some summary points on connections, our work in climate action, and connecting renewable generation. We have also included some examples of work in Gaeltacht areas and on the islands as an appendix to our submission.

ESB Networks is part of ESB Group, a commercial semi-State company, which is overseen by an independent regulator, the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities, since 1999. ESB Networks meets the needs of all 2.4 million Irish electricity customers. We do not generate or sell electricity. Our role is to design, build, own, operate and maintain the electricity distribution network and, as transmission asset owner, to design, build and maintain the onshore electricity transmission network. There is approximately 180,000 km of electricity network across Ireland.

Our capital expenditure in 2022 was €869 million across all of our work programmes, including network connections. This is part of an overall €4.4 billion investment programme under our PR5 regulatory contract set by the CRU in 2020 for the 2021-25 period.

We have approximately 3,700 employees. This is a number that is increasing as we have a growing programme of work to meet the needs of the country and all electricity customers. We have recruited over 650 people in all parts of Ireland since January 2022, including by doubling our apprentice intake to 96 per year. We are also very proud to note that 25% of our latest intake of apprentice network technicians are female. We are a national organisation that is woven into the fabric of communities across the country. We are committed to continuing to grow our delivery capability to enable any further increases in both housing and renewable connections over the years ahead.

We have a central role in the delivery of the Climate Action Plan 2023 by connecting renewable generation, enabling the electrification of heat and transport and in other areas such as electricity demand flexibility, enabling the home retrofit programme and installing smart meters across Ireland. We launched our networks for net zero strategy in January 2023. This aligns fully with the Climate Action Plan 2023 targets and sets out our future plans to help to deliver net zero for Ireland.

In 2022 we completed over 33,800 domestic connections in addition to over 5,000 business connections. Further details are provided later in our submission. This was an increase of 36% when compared to 2021. In the first ten months of 2023, we completed almost 28,000 new domestic connections to the electricity network. This is 3.2% ahead of the number for the same period in 2022. Again, further details are provided in our submission.

ESB Networks is supporting the connection of renewable energy across the electricity transmission network and at all voltages on the distribution network. We have approximately 76,000 microgeneration projects connected to the network, and we are processing over 700 per week. For larger renewable connections, where a developer seeks the ability to export electricity, ESB Networks carries out a technical assessment and quotes the developer for the costs associated with upgrading the network to enable this electricity to be exported. This is in line with regulated connection policy.

We support innovation and climate action projects in Gaeltacht areas and the islands. Appendix 2 of our submission contains details of our Dingle project, which tested the development of low-carbon technologies in partnership with the local community. Another example is where we are working to support the REACT project in partnership with Údarás na Gaeltachta on Inis Mór. We have included a brief description of this project in appendix 2. We have also included some examples of the work we undertake on both the islands and in Gaeltacht areas to support these communities.

We engage with stakeholders and customers nationally to collaborate with them to deliver this programme of work. The provision of infrastructure and electricity network connections for housing and renewables has always been a key area for our business and will continue to be for the future. We rely on our relationships with landowners in rural communities, which we value very highly, to deliver projects across the country.

The requirements for housing, a growing economy and delivering on Ireland’s climate action plan will necessitate a major and sustained investment in the electricity network. This can only be achieved by having skilled people, a robust supply chain, and public support for this growing programme of work over the years ahead.

This is the end of our introduction, and with that, I will hand back to the Chair. I am happy to take any questions from members.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I am joined today by my colleagues Anthony Skeffington, regional operational and maintenance manager, and Des Joyce, water treatment manager and asset planning. With our colleagues, we work together in overseeing the planning, delivery and management of Uisce Éireann’s water services. We welcome the invitation to address the committee today and to take the opportunity to provide information on some of our activities in delivering water services to rural areas and the islands of Ireland.

We are Ireland’s national publicly owned water services utility responsible for the delivery of secure, safe and sustainable water services for the people of Ireland. Our purpose is to rise to the challenge of delivering transformative water services that enable communities to thrive. Our vision is a sustainable Ireland where water is respected and protected for the planet and all the lives it supports.

The Water Services Acts 2007 to 2020 set out the arrangements for the oversight and delivery of water and wastewater services by Uisce Éireann, with our primary function being to provide clean drinking water to customers and to treat and return wastewater safely to the environment. To deliver this, we work closely with our economic regulator, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, our environmental regulator, the Environment Protection Agency, and with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and all local authorities in the development of a number of strategy, planning and investment processes.

Uisce Éireann’s strategic funding plan and capital investment plan set out our ambition for the building, repair and upgrading of Uisce Éireann water treatment plants, wastewater treatment plants, and water and sewer networks. From 2020 to 2024, we are investing €5.35 billion to improve and deliver the infrastructure required to make this country not only competitive internationally, but also to improve the quality of life for its citizens and to protect the environment.

We look at national data, policies and plans that have a direct impact on where investment should be prioritised or which have a dependence on the public water and wastewater infrastructure, such as housing, job growth and environmental policies, and climate action plans.

To this end, Uisce Éireann published its first national water resources plan for the long-term, safe and sustainable water supply needs of the country over the next 25 years. The plan is underpinned by four regional water resources plans for the north west, south west, south east and east and midlands. Making progress in housing connections is also a top priority for Uisce Éireann. A dedicated team and initiatives have been put in place to support our role in the delivery of the Government’s Housing for All programme. The delivery of water and wastewater capacity is vital to support economic growth locally and nationally. Supporting the Department of Rural and Community Development, we are working to deliver specific actions under the Our Rural Future and Our Living Islands policies. Our key action within Our Rural Future is to invest in infrastructure, including water and wastewater infrastructure, to support the development of rural towns and villages.

In 2022, Uisce Éireann delivered €1.06 billion in capital expenditure delivering water and wastewater projects and programmes across the country, prioritising the most urgent improvements in water quality, wastewater capacity and compliance, leakage reduction and sustainability. In 2023, this investment will rise to €1.2 billion. Our operational expenditure is also an investment in the operation and maintenance of existing assets in towns and villages. We are currently investing €250 million per year to reduce leakage on our water network, with leakage rates decreasing from almost 46% in 2018 to 37% at the end of 2022.

Additionally, the small towns and villages growth programme was established in direct response to requirements for rural support and is captured in Our Rural Future and Uisce Éireann’s capital investment plan 2020 to 2024. This is a national programme to cater for growth in smaller towns and villages with existing Uisce Éireann infrastructure. Local authorities support the programme by identifying and prioritising communities in need of investment. Uisce Éireann has announced a total of 50 projects to date to progress across the country. Uisce Éireann is progressing a number of initiatives to support the supply and maintenance of water services to islands that have public water and wastewater infrastructure. In line with the recently published Our Living Islands national policy, we are undertaking feasibility analyses in a number of areas which will inform the direction of future investment. The provision of water services on some of the islands presents a challenge due to limited water availability, environmental constraints and the logistical challenges of servicing infrastructure not on the mainland. We may need to find alternative solutions. Nevertheless, Uisce Éireann has already carried out a number of improvement works to water infrastructure on a number of the islands.

We thank committee members for the invitation to meet this morning and are happy to respond to as many questions as possible. We will of course take away more specific queries and respond to the committee by means of follow-up correspondence.

An Cathaoirleach

I thank all of the witnesses for their evidence and time this morning. I have a few questions; I might start with Mr. O'Reilly. I will talk about something parochial, but it applies across the country, which is wastewater treatment facilities in many smaller towns and villages. In east Galway, for example, in villages like Castleblakeney, Creggs, Kilconnell and Caltra, wastewater treatment facilities are grossly inadequate and raw sewage runs onto the streets. Yet, nothing seems to be happening to address the capital needs for those treatment facilities. This forces many people in those communities to live either in Galway city or Ballinasloe. It is not possible for them to remain in their own parishes because there are no serviced sites available. This is replicated across the country. How can this challenge be dealt with? There is huge demand in growing towns to develop capacity and ensuring the construction of large numbers of houses but we will lose the fabric of rural Ireland if there is no investment in small-scale wastewater treatment facilities. What is Irish Water specifically doing to address situations like those in east Galway?

More for clarification more than anything, but ESB Networks stated that it has responsibility for maintaining the onshore electricity transmission network. As the witnesses know, there will be significant development of an offshore electricity network in the near future. What role does ESB Networks have in that regard or is it primarily an EirGrid issue? Will the witnesses elaborate on that? I wish to return to another question which I will put to the other witnesses.

On the CRU and the regulation of utilities, a primary responsibility of the regulator is to protect customers and ensure charges are fair. There is a weakness in assessments at the moment. Some electricity providers, EirGrid or ESB Networks, make a submission to the CRU setting out their plans for the next period. The CRU looks at them and the related costings. There is a weakness in getting an independent assessment and whether this is the most cost-effective and robust long-term solution. While the CRU looks at the proposals, it does not have a mechanism to say this is not the appropriate solution. There does not seem to be an independent mechanism to evaluate that. In theory, it comes before the committee and, in theory, the committee can scrutinise it but that does not happen. How can that particular issue be addressed? In that context, every cost in connecting to the grid is ultimately borne by the consumer either directly or indirectly. A practical example is in my parish, where a new peak gas-fired station is being built in Monksland. On two adjoining sites, a substantial solar farm and wind energy project are being built. Those projects bring three separate connections to the local substation, all going along the same road and into the same trenches. As we are talking about solar, wind and a peak plant, power will only be in one of those three cables at any one time. Why is there no joined-up thinking? This is also a question for ESB Networks. The customer is paying for three electricity connections when one would do, in all likelihood. There does not seem to be a mechanism to put the brakes on issues like that. Will the witnesses clarify that matter?

To the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, the witness is correct - the Government set an ambitious target of 80% renewable electricity by 2030. We do not know how we will do it. There is absolutely no information about how that will happen. In fact, Wind Energy Ireland published a report earlier this week stating that the industry does not believe we will achieve this within that timeline. In contrast, we heard evidence in September on Oileán Árainn Mhór about island communities wanting to export more renewable electricity to the national grid but they cannot get the mechanism to do it. In Mr. Finnegan's evidence this morning, he made the point that at least 15 applications will be reserved under the enduring connection programme for community projects. I presume - correct me if I am wrong - that these will also be subject to auctions like the others. If that is the case, the island projects will never get off the ground because their grid connections will be substantially more expensive than those on the mainland. Second, we do not have clarity on the planning process. When that happens, it will be more a complicated process than it is on the mainland.

Again it leaves the islands on the back foot as regards this. We heard evidence from the Department of Rural and Community Development. There is an EU islands initiative for renewable energy. We should be trying to front-load and support that. We cannot do that with the current approach that is being taken. Related to that, there is a plan-led approach for offshore renewable development, which is the right way to go on this. Is there a mechanism whereby, if some of the areas that are zoned are close to inhabited islands, we would be able to provide, in conjunction with connecting large areas of offshore renewables, a connection onto the islands? Is there any mechanism to facilitate that? There are a few questions there and we will start with Irish Water and work back from there. Will Mr. O'Reilly start?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

With regard to servicing wastewater needs I will first address the national picture and then focus on the east Galway situation. There is the set-up of the small towns and villages growth programme which was referenced in the opening statement. That was set up in the past two years in recognition of the need to provide investment in smaller communities, primarily from a wastewater perspective. In recent years Irish Water has initiated and is progressing 50 projects that are addressing primarily wastewater and sump water needs. The level of expenditure on these projects once they are completed will be significant. We estimate it will be at least €300 million for those projects on their own. It is worth noting those 50 projects are part of a cohort of approximately 300 nationally where there is a need to increase the capacity in our wastewater treatment infrastructure to allow growth in rural areas.

From an east Galway perspective, as we applied the small towns programme to Galway in particular, two candidate sites came through that required investment. The Chair is probably aware of those two sites being Mountbellew and Ballygar. Both of those are progressing with projects under way.

In terms of the smaller settlements the Chair mentioned, they may fall under the infrastructure that does not currently reside within Uisce Éireann and we can check that after the fact and come back to him with more detail. For that type of infrastructure there are housing estates that would have been built a number of years previously and had stand-alone treatment plants provided by the developers at the time. They are known as developer-provided infrastructure. There is a process to follow to address these. That in itself represents a major problem nationally. There are approximately 540 of these particular types of estates throughout the country that have stand-alone wastewater treatment plants and they are in varying degrees of maintenance and operation. A number of them are causing quite a big problem, as the Chair referenced. Uisce Éireann is working very closely with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage on that. Currently, the responsibility in terms of taking these in charge lies with the planning authority and we are working with the Department to look at ways of resolving this. There is a very big path and investment need ahead of us to address all of these issues.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

The main question for ESB Networks in the Chair's questions was around the split of responsibilities between ourselves and EirGrid to do with offshore wind. ESB Networks has three licences from the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, CRU. One is as distribution system operator, the second is as distribution asset owner and then as onshore transmission asset owner. EirGrid as the transmissions system operator also has responsibility for the ownership of the assets that are offshore. The key interface for ESB Networks when it comes to offshore wind is when those transmission projects come onshore and there is a need for onshore reinforcement of transmission to enable that electricity to come onshore and then be transmitted and distributed around the country.

For the transmission projects onshore, what we see, as Mr. Finnegan mentioned, is that there are approximately 350 transmission projects to be delivered. Some of those projects are on the east coast for the first phase of the offshore wind projects to reinforce the transmission network onshore. When those projects are brought forward by EirGrid once consents, including landowner consents, are established, they then come to ESB Networks for procurement, design and construction, so we have a major role to enable offshore wind but it is on the onshore transmission assets.

Mr. Jim Gannon

In the first instance on the price reviews and controls and revenue control in the case of Irish Water, the CRU is the independent reviewer and regulator to perform that review around cost efficiency and planning. Over the course of a price review or price control, it is an 18-month to two-year activity. The CRU initially sets out priorities in line with Government policy at the time and that can change over time. Separately, we engage in multiple rounds of open public consultation. Third, we always have expert economic and technical consultants on board with us to ensure the technical and economic challenges are provided in the development of the price control or price review. Following our decision, we have mechanisms within the five-year period that track that performance and efficiency against the incentives and reporting requirements we set. These are published annually for all to view and provide feedback on. Even this time around it was mentioned there is an agile investment framework. This allows changes given the changing and acceleration of some national policies around decarbonisation, for example, and how we might achieve that in different ways than might have been predicted at the outset of the price review process. We have allowed flexibility there but there is a transparency and inefficiency challenge around that.

The area of multiple connections is a complex one. There have been examples - I think there was one in Mayo - where two wind farms were being developed and it made more sense to look at a combined, single connection into the major connection point of the grid. In terms of specific cases, there can be multiple developers on different timing tracks for their own projects and they all have the right to access the grid. In the case of multiple types of technologies, they may all be useful at peak periods. Notwithstanding that, we should focus on improving that process and making it more efficient where we have foresight. In the past month and a half the CRU published a paper on renewable energy hubs. This is a pilot which seeks to identify areas of the grid where multiple renewable projects might be serviced by single or more centralised grid connections to make that more efficient case and to align timings with that. We did that with ESB Networks.

Separately and importantly, we are about to publish our first decision of three on hybrid projects. This allows developers to put multiple projects behind a single grid connection more easily and to reduce barriers to that. That could be quite important for isolated and island communities in particular. Where a wind farm and-or a solar farm and-or battery storage would be behind a single constrained connection point, they can still make maximum use of those kilowatt hours because now they can install wind plus solar or wind plus storage. That can make sure more of those kilowatt hours are used locally, decarbonised and in no way wasted, even with a constrained grid. It makes more efficient use of the resource at the site, reducing that need for additional grid requirements, which again leads to cost for others.

Mr. John Finnegan

From the Chair's first very general and important question as to how we get to the 80% target, because it is a huge target, I hope I can reassure the Chair that the targets in the climate action plan, CAP, are based on evidence. In particular for CAP 2023, EirGrid was preparing its Shaping Our Electricity Future strategy document at the same time. That is part of EirGrid's responsibility, to do modelling and forecasting of what the whole system needs to look like. The Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications worked with EirGrid and made sure the assumptions and targets it was setting itself in that planning were those of the carbon budget. That is the starting point for all of this. That then required the 80% target. We then ensured the actions in the climate action plan, the targets for onshore and offshore wind and for storage, were the actions needed to reach the 80% target, which in turn is what is needed to meet the carbon budgets. There is a plan. The climate action plan, EirGrid's plans, ESB Networks' plans, and the targets we have as a Department for subsidising onshore and offshore renewables are a cohesive programme of work to reach that 80% target, which in turn is what is needed to meet our climate targets.

The Chair moved on to the specifics of, in this case, an island scheme. If there is an island scheme, yes, those 15 connections are available for them.

If an island scheme applies for the connection and gets one of those, it is not an auction process. They are offered the connection the same way as any other renewable project, on a cost basis. On an island, the cost may be higher than a scheme that happens to be closer to where the grid is stronger. There may also be planning difficulties. An island scheme faces all the difficulties of a community scheme but in a more extreme way. Any community scheme tends to be further away from existing generation and use, almost by definition, and faces a more challenging planning environment and, therefore, higher costs. That is why the forthcoming small-scale renewable scheme is so different. We are hearing from community groups, and it would apply more intensely to island-based schemes, that the RESS is more suitable for large-scale and utility-scale schemes, particularly the competitive aspect of it. They enter an auction and the most cost-effective scheme is picked. This will be designed for communities, to engage with communities, select community projects and give them the resources and the additional technical help, capability-building and subsidy they need to make the scheme work. The forthcoming small-scale scheme is a recognition of the particular difficulties community schemes have, which would be most keenly felt by island schemes. The response is this non-competitive one.

On offshore, we will take that away. It is exactly the plan that it be plan-led. The starting point for these plans will be seabed planning: which are the areas where the best wind is available and where we are interfering less with wildlife, the natural environment and the livelihood of fishers? We will pick the optimum places for that and built the grid around it. The advantage of that is you are planning it in advance and if that grid creates additional opportunities when it passes island or coastal communities, then that opportunity is there.

We all read with great concern the report earlier this week from Wind Energy Ireland. We deal daily with all those people. It is a very active and engaged industry which has done enormous things in Ireland and we are happy and proud to work with it and on everything it does. We recognise the concerns. It is planning and grid. That is what we spend much of our time working on. We have made a lot of progress on it, as evidenced by the success of the wind industry. There is more to be done and we have many interesting things happening that should address the concerns.

On planning, the next revision of the national planning framework will expressly recognise renewables and the infrastructure required. That will be driven down under the new scheme coming from the new planning Act. The fact renewables are recognised in national policy will be driven down through the regional and local plans so the process of getting planning permission for renewable projects should be much easier. In general, the reforms of planning and resourcing-up of planning bodies will help renewable projects in the same way they will help any investment.

In terms of grid, the enduring connection policy, ECP, which is the current system for connections, has been a great success. There were huge concerns before it was introduced about timelines. In general, the feedback has been very good. It comes to an end this year. Our colleagues in CRU, together with EirGrid and the ESB, are working on the successor to it. The aim is to further increase the availability of connections and reduce the timelines so we can meet these ambitious targets and our legal objectives under EU directives, which require us to develop these projects in a timely way.

An Cathaoirleach

I will not dwell on it but whether it is cost base, auction or bid, it is all the same in the impact it has on island communities. The island co-operatives are prepared to play under the current rules; the difficulty is getting the grid connection. It will be more expensive to do that from the offshore islands. Their ability to generate electricity and additional income is curtailed by their physical location. It is the responsibility in part of Our Rural Future and its island policy to try to level the playing pitch. As long as cost is a factor – it may not be the sole factor but, even with the micro projects, it will still be a factor – these communities will lose out. It will have to be looked at. Other members will come in on it.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I thank the witnesses for coming in. Creidim go bhfuil an cruinniú seo thar a bheith tábhachtach. Tá go leor le plé. I will concentrate in the first part of my questioning on the provision of ordinary services to ordinary dwellers in rural Ireland. I will make a few general comments. First, we have a large number of rural areas with declining populations. The CLÁR areas were defined as those which had lost 30% of their population since 1926. The population of the State has gone up enormously since then but there are areas losing population. I do not think the present census shows any massive bounceback. Much of the problem is structural. Second, because we all operate in silos and EU rules and whatever, there are not up-to-date mechanisms in place - and I will come back to how they might be put in place if we can get the information - to rebalance the affordability of living and building in rural Ireland. I believe the State is meant to be disruptive when the market fails. I do not believe in market forces on their own. Of course, the State does not either because we interfere with everything, if we see a need. Sometimes we have more hang-ups than at other times. The idea of the CLÁR and special islands capital programmes was to be disruptive. The big enemy of infrastructure in rural Ireland is the cost-benefit analysis. You will always find somewhere with a better cost-benefit analysis than an island, a lowly populated small rural village or a one-off house.

I often notice when I return to Dublin, where I grew up, that there is continuous massive investment in urban areas in water and wastewater. Look at the investment in Poolbeg since I grew up again and again and more to follow, and rightly so. I have no problem with that. Every house that will ever feed into that will gain from it but there is no cost to them. The State foots the bill when the main pipes are extended. This is pertinent to what I am going to say.

On the other hand, the communities I am referring to have capacity in schools - something that is scarce at the moment - space, capacity in the health and community services and capacity in sporting and community facilities. All they are screaming out for are people to use those fantastic facilities. With that in mind, I have a number of specific questions, but it is important to understand where I am coming from.

If I am building a new rural house, will ESB Networks outline how it charges for the electricity connection to that house? In particular, how does it charge for distance from the nearest pole or wherever the relevant connection point is, from ESB Networks' point of view? Is it the transformer or the pole, or does it combine the whole lot to get a price?

Is it the full economic cost that is charged or is some element of cross-subsidy built into that?

I have the same question for Irish Water. My understanding is that Irish Water charges the full economic cost from the point that the Uisce Éireann supply ends to the proposed end of the council road. It might be asked why I said "council road", but this is important. In rural Ireland, in some cases, we are getting house connections that are allowed put the pipe under the non-council road, but where it is a council road, it has to be done by Uisce Éireann at a cost of, I understand, €300 per metre. There is then a €2,500 or €3,000 fixed charge. The Uisce Éireann representatives might outline the scale of charges, but to put that into scale, €300 a metre gives you 3 x 104, which by my calculation is €30,000 for 100 m. Again, is any subsidy involved or is Uisce Éireann paying the whole economic cost, even though it is putting in public infrastructure that is under a public road?

Will the CRU outline how it assesses what it should cost ESB Networks to put in an electricity supply and what it costs Irish Water or Uisce Éireann to do the same thing? Particularly in the case of Uisce Éireann, all the local contractors tell us they could do it a lot cheaper to the same required standard. As somebody who has been directly and indirectly involved in many group water schemes, they were done to standard and have operated perfectly since we did them. It seems, not only to me but to people a lot more knowledgeable than me, that an exorbitant cost was arrived at. My final question for CRU on this module is whether it is legal for the Government to decide, as it effectively does in urban areas, to subsidise by direct State grant the provision of these rural infrastructures.

I have many more questions and issues I wish to raise, but I ask the Chair to take that group together.

An Cathaoirleach

We will start with ESB Networks.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

I thank the Deputy for his questions. By way of an introductory remark on the whole area of investment in rural communities, one of the benefits that has come out of the investment in renewables over the past 20 or 30 years is that it has led to an investment in grid infrastructure right across, especially if you consider the growth of wind on the west coast. That has been one of the knock-on benefits when it comes to rural communities.

To deal with the Deputy's specific question on connection costs for rural houses, I will first set the scene on it a little. Our connection charges are published every year. They are updated and that process is overseen by the CRU. All our standard charging for connections, for both rural and urban domestic houses, is set out in those charges. The cost of a 12 kVA standard connection for a rural house is just less than €3,500. I will ask my colleague, Mr. Rossiter, to say a little more on this shortly. As I said, however, the costs are published.

Part of the Deputy's question was-----

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

The specifics.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

Mr. Rossiter will cover the specifics, if we are in a position today to cover the very specific question about distance to the transformer and the poles. That is covered in our statement on connection charges, which we hope to get to in a second.

The Deputy also mentioned how our costs compare. One of the things done as part of the price review process, and Mr. Gannon outlined this when he talked about PR5, is that our costs, when we submit them in our business plans, are compared with other utilities. Specialist consultants are brought in to review our costs. That is part of the process to oversee us as a natural monopoly to make sure our costs are cost effective.

When it comes to the charging arrangements, the connecting customer does not pay the full economic cost of the connection. Approximately 50% of the cost is borne by the connecting customer and the other 50% is covered across the general customer base. I will ask Mr. Rossiter to cover a couple of the Deputy's specific questions around distance, etc.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

On our statement of charges, we have a number of what we call standard charges. In the case of a one-off rural house or dwelling, it is a common, standard charge applied irrespective of where the residence is. That charge represents 50% of the cost of ESB Networks constructing that charge for the standard connection. What we define as a standard connection is a 12 kVA or 16 kVA supply. That is a standard cost, provided someone is within 500 m of our MV network. Anything over and above that 500 m has an additional charge per metre of the MV overhead line, or cable as it would be in that instance. It is 50% of the charge, up to 500 m, for those connections.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Is it the full cost after 500 m?

Mr. Alan Rossiter

It is 100% per metre after 500 m.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Can we get the cost per metre?

Mr. Alan Rossiter

According to our latest charges, if it is a single-phase overhead metered connection, and the MV is 10 kV or 20 kV, the cost is €9.10 per metre.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It is €9.10. No wonder I am not getting any complaints.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

If it is an underground connection on a road or path, it is €244.90 per metre. That is 50% of the costs. If is on grass, the cost is €87.80 per metre. As I said, however, the vast bulk of our connections are within 500 m of a medium voltage network. It is only in exceptional circumstances that it would be beyond that 500 m.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I would like to tease this through in detail.

An Cathaoirleach

Very briefly.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Is the first 500 m or less covered by the €3,500 or do you pay per metre?

Mr. Alan Rossiter

Yes. It is a standard charge.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It is just €3,500. That is it.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

It is €3,500, including VAT.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I will ask my colleague, Mr. Skeffington, to go through the detail. I will give some high-level stats before that. In 2022, Uisce Éireann made connection offers for 36,989 units, which was up 14% on the previous year, and we enabled 4,250 connections to water service infrastructure, which was associated with 25,000 homes. Up to June 2023, we have made almost 22,000 offers. We will have more numbers on that coming through. I will ask my colleague, Mr. Skeffington, to go through the specific detail on the connections.

Mr Anthony Skeffington

Uisce Éireann has a connection policy and charges, which are set out under the CRU-approved connection charging policy. Water charges are CRU approved under that. This came into effect in 2019. All Uisce Éireann customers pay the same for the same type of connection. The policy provides for a consistent connection service and a uniform, transparent and fair charging approach to all connecting customers. The charges are calculated in a cost-reflective manner based on connection type.

For domestic water connections within 10 m of the public water network, the standard charge is now €2,272. For wastewater, it is €3,929. Uisce Éireann will provide a full connection service to a customer's boundary where all components of the connections are performed by Uisce Éireann. For anything above 10 m, we have regional contractors that price for that work. The cost is reflective of the type of work and where the connection has to be placed.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Can Mr. Skeffington confirm that is €300 per metre in places like Connemara?

Mr Anthony Skeffington

I cannot confirm that at the moment but I will get back to the Deputy on it and give him the details.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

This is where you have seen the big problems. Somebody is effectively putting in public infrastructure because, as I have said, there is only a charge for it when it is under a public road. If it is under a non-public road, an LIS road or a public road that has not been taken in charge, people are allowed put it in themselves at a much lower cost. Can Mr. Skeffington quickly calculate what it would cost to go 510 m? That would be the cost for 500 m because the first 10 m are included in the €2,272. Would it be 500 times €300?

Mr Anthony Skeffington

Yes, if it was €300. I will confirm that for the Deputy.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It would be 500 times €300.

Mr Anthony Skeffington

Yes.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

That is about €150,000.

Mr Anthony Skeffington

Yes, that is correct.

An Cathaoirleach

It is €350,000.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It is €150,000.

An Cathaoirleach

I am sorry; it is €150,000.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

That is the case even though the pipe will be Uisce Éireann's and will be under the ground forever, available to anybody else who wants to connect their site to that final point.

Mr Anthony Skeffington

That is correct.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I think people will be getting an idea of the problem.

An Cathaoirleach

I call on Mr. Gannon.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I am sorry, but may I just ask one more question? My understanding is that it is taking 16 weeks for a pre-connection inquiry to Uisce Éireann for a one-off house. The excuse being given is that it might put pressure on the water supply. If the water supply is that tight, there is a problem before that one house is added. The increase in water use in a house where there is a new baby is probably greater than the water use in a house that has only two adults in it.

An Cathaoirleach

Does Mr. Skeffington want to address that question?

Mr Anthony Skeffington

I will get back to the Deputy on that.

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

As part of our role as regulator over both Uisce Éireann and ESB Networks, we established national charging regimes for connections. There were different timeframes. Obviously, the electricity one has been in place for some time. Uisce Éireann's is more recent. We looked to apply standard principles to the establishment of those charging regimes. These included cost reflectivity, equity and simplicity in order that people could understand the charges coming their way. On a national basis, there are standard charges, which both entities have outlined, and published metrics as to how more complex or distant connections are charged. All of those connection charging regimes were subject to intense public consultation over several phases and several periods. In the case of the more recently introduced regime, Uisce Éireann's, we engaged with An Fóram Uisce and user groups and tried to extend the consultation as broadly as we could, appreciating that it is a fairly complex process for individual users to engage with. The results are published charges. We also benchmarked and looked at international comparators in the EU and the UK in coming to those decisions. We also operate a dispute resolution mechanism whereby customers of either ESB Networks or Uisce Éireann who have a complaint about the connection offer made to them, having gone through the process with the relevant entity, can take that dispute up with our customer care team, which will resolve it against published criteria.

The Deputy raised an important question about contestability where others could come in and do some of the works. There is provision for contestability at a certain level, although it is probably more for larger connections to the electricity grid. A developer can ask for a third party to build the connection, subject to compliance with technical standards. For Uisce Éireann, we have recently introduced a policy in respect of self-laying on public roads. We can provide more information on that but, again, it is designed to bring in an element of contestability, subject to ensuring standards and compliance with technical requirements and, in some cases, safety requirements for customers.

The Deputy also asked a question about subsidies. I am not sure what is permissible under the legal framework as regards electricity but I note that it has not been the case in the past that the Government has subvented network development in Ireland at any level. The regime for Uisce Éireann is obviously very different and there are Government subsidies but, as the entities will have outlined, for individual connections, on the principle of equity, customers pay a portion of the shallow charges, that is, charges for connection to the key network. The costs of deep reinforcement, major works needed to support broader connections, are socialised and paid for by all customers. That principle of equity between how much an individual connecting customer pays versus the broader customer group is really important to us in coming to those decisions.

Mr. Jim Gannon

I will make a really quick comment. In addition to the decision in respect of self-laying on public roads that was recently made, on which we will afford more detail, in May of this year, we also made a decision on first mover disadvantage. This means that an individual or developer who lays that first pipe or pays for its laying will be compensated should someone else connect to that pipe. However, if nobody else connects to it, that cost remains with that individual. Again, we can provide more detail to the committee on that decision.

An Cathaoirleach

I will bring in Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh and then come back to Deputy Ó Cuív.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I will just finish on this one and then cede-----

An Cathaoirleach

The Deputy must be very brief. I know he has other questions but I want to-----

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I will come back to those later. I will just finish this module because I think we are making good progress. From the CRU's point of view, could Uisce Éireann make a decision that, like ESB Networks, it would socialise half of the cost of putting this public infrastructure in the ground up to a certain distance, perhaps the 500 m that applies with ESB Networks? Furthermore, could it extend the 10 m to a longer decision? Was that Uisce Éireann's decision or the CRU's? We have to know who to chase because of the socialisation of the charge and the fact that this is public infrastructure that others can tap into.

Ms MacEvilly made a point. She is obviously way younger than I am but, while it is true the State does not give a direct subsidy to ESB Networks, when I built my house many years ago, it was 50% subsidised because there was a clear State policy to connect the country to electricity. There was much more control over State bodies at the time but that was a clear Government policy and we achieved it. That was for one utility. We are getting there on the broadband but we are not nearly there with water, which I will come back to later. We are totally failing on water. There was a clear Government policy to socialise 50% of the cost up to 500 m and we can be thankful it has survived into the modern era. I presume that covers the vast majority of electricity connections. Under CRU regulations and the various European regulations, which, at times, seem weird to me, would it be within the remit of Uisce Éireann to decide to go to X metres, a lot more than 10 m, and to socialise the rest of the cost on a 50-50 basis? I really look forward to getting the self-build proposals from the CRU and seeing whether they are pertinent to the ordinary individual building a one-off house. I do not like the term "one-off" house but I am talking about building a house in a dispersed settlement.

Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire took the Chair.

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

The vast majority of costs relating to the operation, maintenance and development of our ESB distribution and transmission networks are socialised. When we are building new connection or new major infrastructure, building out, reinforcing the grid, all those costs are socialised across all customer groups. We are talking about an individual customer seeking to connect to that larger grid. In the case of Uisce Éireann it is a bit different as there is Government support for the domestic customers' portion of the subsidised costs.

We consulted extensively on the equity principle of how much an individual connecting customer should pay versus all the rest of the customers, including that customer once they are connected or in the case of Uisce Éireann the Government on its behalf. We found the approach we are adopting is the fairest approach. It is equitable, clear and transparent. It is the same for all customers regardless of where they are connecting. Following extensive analysis and consultation, we believe it gets the balance right between the socialised cost and the cost for individual connections. That is the decision we arrived at. That has been implemented since 2019, I think, in the case of water. It has been the same for some time in the case of ESB Networks. There is a provision that we would not unfairly discriminate against different customers and different classes of customers. That is the balance we must maintain when coming to those decisions.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

If our friends in the CLÁR section of the Department of rural development were to step in with a grant of 50% to any new customer, would Ms MacEvilly have a legal difficulty with that?

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

Would that be a grant fund rather than-----

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I do not care what way the costs come down. I am only exploring all the possibilities. We will come back to this another day.

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

That would be a policy matter for the Government.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Let us presume the Government had a policy. I had policies like that when I was a Minister. The policy issue is easy; it is a two-minute job. We will be coming to that section after a while. My question is whether there would be a legal difficulty with it.

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

I think we would need to understand that a bit better.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It would be very useful. I hear what Ms MacEvilly is saying about equity and the public. However, equity is always in the view of the beholder. The one-off house owner does not anticipate this cost and therefore they are not making submissions to public consultations. Ms MacEvilly and I have been around long enough to know that public consultations are very much the province of the professionals but there are not that many professionals championing one-off houses. That is why this committee is dealing with this issue. Inevitably the politicians will need to decide the equity issue here.

Ms Aoife MacEvilly

I apologise; I should have mentioned that in the case of domestic water connections, there is a Government subvention which is consistent with our regime because the charges are still in place but the developer is refunded charges for building existing housing. So there possibly is a model there.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I ask Ms MacEvilly to send us details of that. I will be back.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

We can bring the Deputy back in again later. I call Deputy Conway-Walsh.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

It is really useful to have all of the witnesses in the room together. My questions are mainly for Irish Water, but I have one question for ESB Networks. We had an outage across north Mayo for nearly 24 hours last week and the outages seem to be more frequent. What is the reason for that? Many households are left without light, heat and water. A lot of food in fridges and freezers had to be disposed of. What assurances can ESB Networks give to households and businesses? What is in place when people lose out on so much?

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

The outage the Deputy is referring to was a major fault at the Cunghill 110 kV substation in west Sligo on 25 November. Approximately 10,000 customers were off. The outage happened close to midnight on a Saturday night. Overnight that night and into the following day, a huge amount of work was done because six of our medium voltage substations were affected by that fault. Unfortunately, there were customers affected by that on that Sunday. A huge amount of work was done to bring the customers back during the course of that day. It was because of a very unusual technical failure related to what is called an electricity disconnect in that substation. It was an unusual fault and it affected a big group of customers which, of course, we regret happening. There was a huge amount of work done to bring those customers back.

Considering the broader regime, one of the most important metrics we have is called customer minutes lost. It is about the amount of time on average that a customer can be without electricity over the course of a year. Our performance last year was approximately-----

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Because I am short of time I want to ask if this is likely to happen again in the Mayo area. Is the Mayo and Sligo area in general more vulnerable to such outages? Is there any compensation in place for customers?

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

We have a predominantly overhead line network meaning that, unfortunately, outages are part of that regime. We do a lot of work to maintain it. We are still investigating the root cause of this one but it was an unusual one. Therefore, we do not expect it to be some kind of systemic issue for customers in the north Mayo and Sligo area. We have a 6:1 ratio of overhead lines to cables. Unfortunately, with an overhead line network we will have faults on the network. We are investing very heavily to reduce those. We have a big investment programme. As part of our contracts under the regulatory framework, we are incentivised to address it.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

When Mr. Tarrant has fuller information on the technical problem, he will be able to give more assurances. Would he be able to give that full information to the committee when he gets it, which will allow us to inform our constituents? People need to know whether they should stock up their freezers for Christmas again after having done it and thrown everything out last week. People need information.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

We are happy to follow up on that specific incident and bring the information back to the committee. We are also happy to provide specific briefings for public representatives from that area, separate from the committee if that is of interest.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Has an incident like that occurred in other areas? I am trying to establish if this area is more prone to it.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

It is unusual and perhaps Mr. Rossiter can comment from the point of view of high voltage faults. They are rare but they do happen. We had a few significant outages in different places over the past two years but this was a specific one. I have seen pictures of the incident where a piece of equipment failed. We are looking to get to the bottom of it. I ask Mr. Rossiter to comment on the frequency of these incidents.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

Incidents such as these are very rare. There have only been a small number of HV outages this year and they have not been located in the Mayo area; they have been dispersed. This outage was our biggest single outage this year. It was an anomaly and we will be doing a detailed investigation on it.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

ESB Networks will let us have the information. Is there any compensation for consumers through credits or anything else for the loss they have endured?

Mr. Alan Rossiter

Not following a fault. As Mr. Tarrant mentioned, we have a predominantly overhead network and faults would be a feature of that, albeit we are aiming to operate to best practice on our standard-----

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Therefore, there is no comeback for customers. They just wait and-----

Mr. Alan Rossiter

The aim is to get the reliability of the network to such a level that these are very infrequent occurrences for that length of time.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

ESB Networks should let the committee have the full information and we can talk a bit from there.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

We will send that to the committee.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

I ask about the interface between Irish Water and the local authorities. Group water schemes are predominantly in rural areas and on every day, many people in rural areas are left without water.

What can we do to improve the interface between Uisce Éireann and the local authorities?

I want to ask about circular WSP01/16. What is the justification for requiring sureties when dealing with community water schemes? The main issue is the debt faced by group water schemes that are waiting for Uisce Éireann to take them over to wipe off that debt. Uisce Éireann is saying it will not take over the group water schemes until they are up to a certain standard, and that is fine, but the local authority is saying it does not have the resources is to bring the group water schemes up to the standard demanded by Uisce Éireann. In the meantime, customers are left without water. Volunteers who hear of billions of euro being spent in this area are trying their best to supply water to their neighbours and their neighbourhoods. Will Uisce Éireann speak to me about the justification for circular WSP01/16, particularly in relation to planning permissions? This circular relates to procedures for planning authorities with regard to planning permissions, including the conditions related to private developments to be connected to the public water supply. However, it does not reference community water connections, CWCs, which are essentially extensions to public mains and not developments. As such, they do not require planning permission. Will the witnesses bring clarity to that?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I will ask my colleague Mr. Joyce to answer.

Mr. Des Joyce

I thank the Deputy for her question. The circular referenced by the Deputy is a departmental guidance on the steps that have to be taken when a group water scheme is being taken in charge. Essentially a group water scheme is an entity looking for a connection to our supplies and looking to be taken in charge. The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage's rural water section provides grants to bring these schemes up to certain standards. Some of these schemes are been in place for 60 or 70 years so there is a need to have them up to a certain standard. It is only right that the level of leakage should be brought down to the minimum and any of the assets in that network should be improved to a reasonable standard. The standard is not onerous; it is a reasonable standard. In addition-----

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

There are added layers of quality control in place for the CWCs that are not in place for private developer-led works. When it comes to rural water, local authorities are not developers. There appears to be no justification in these circumstances for the added layer of sureties being sought by Uisce Éireann.

Mr. Des Joyce

The requirements are set out in the circular. That is not an Uisce Éireann document. It is the Department's circular.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

The interpretation is often the problem.

Mr. Des Joyce

I do not believe the requirements of Uisce Éireann or the document are onerous. In fact they are reasonable in that they involve getting the leakage in the scheme down, and bringing the scheme up to a minimum quality. The other requirement is that the scheme will have no debt. Any entity that takes over another entity would require that it comes debt-free and in reasonable condition.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

That is the crux of the problem. In the case of a water scheme that has been leaking for years and in respect of which debt has accrued, we are not talking about water that anybody has used, stolen or taken for free. However, because of the state of the piping infrastructure and the lack of sufficient resources, that is the situation people are in. Where do the resources come from? Uisce Éireann is saying that the scheme has to be of a certain standard and I can understand that. What is the solution for group water schemes and for the people who are dependent on something as basic as water in rural areas?

Mr. Des Joyce

In the normal course of events, those involved with the scheme would apply for funding to bring its standard up and to reduce the leaks. In reducing the leaks, it can get leak credits and a reduction on its debt.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Given that the local authority says it does not have the resources, to whom should those involved with scheme apply?

Mr. Des Joyce

In terms of what?

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

The local authorities say they do not have the resources to give to the group water schemes. There is no other funding stream for them to bring the pipes up to standard. Even if they were to bring them up to standard, there is still legacy debt. I am trying to get some clarity on where the responsibility lies and how we get this solved because it is going on for months and years. People see billions of euro being invested, etc., but they do not have water.

Mr. Des Joyce

That is a question for the Department and the rural water section. The resources to deal with it are in Uisce Éireann. We had applications for something like 300 schemes and we have taken 252 in charge. A significant body of work was carried out over the past ten years in dealing with these schemes.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Has Uisce Éireann written off debt in any cases?

Mr. Des Joyce

Debt was dealt with through the provision of a credit for leakage reduction. In many cases, the stated number of domestic connections on the scheme was probably lower than the number in reality. When that was checked and corrected, there was often an entitlement for the debt to be lower than it originally was. That is generally how it is done.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Does the Department want to comment on how we get this resolved in a timely manner and how we get it addressed? The volunteers who run group water schemes are at their absolute wits' end. I am not making political points with it. I just want to make sure everybody in rural Ireland has water and has equality of water in the same way that people in other areas can expect. There is a real equity issue here as well as a health and safety issue.

Mr. Des Joyce

I understand. That is not necessarily our responsibility. Our responsibility starts when the scheme is taken in charge and the whole process kicks off from there.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

That is why I say the interface has to be better. There has to be better connectivity between local authorities, the Department and Uisce Éireann so that people can be guaranteed a water service and we are no longer in a situation where we are relying on volunteerism to deliver water when millions of euro are paid across the board.

Mr. Des Joyce

I accept what the Deputy is saying. We are familiar with the rural water schemes. We know the challenges that they have now.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Can Mr. Joyce or any of the witnesses in the room offer me any assurance here today? Can anyone offer any assurance that these matters will be sorted out and that people will not be left without water on a continuous basis? This debt is hanging over people who never incurred it in the first place. Is there anybody who can provide assurance?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

The Department we are speaking about here - the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage - is not here with us today. I might ask my colleague Mr. Skeffington to add a few points.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

Can I make a point on that? When we submit a question to the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, it passes it back as an Uisce Éireann issue. I can read it out exactly. I am sick and tired of this. It says Uisce Éireann is tasked with this, and it is not the Department's responsibility. People are passed from Billy to Jack and back again without any resolution being presented for these people. When the witnesses talk about the Department-----

Mr. Des Joyce

There has been a good deal of progress made in this area. Perhaps we are getting to the more difficult ones now. That is probably where some of the challenges are. In regard to the progress and the involvement of Uisce Éireann over the past ten years, the numbers speak for themselves. We have taken in charge a tremendous number of schemes. They have gone through vetting and upgrading. That is as much as we can say at this moment.

Mr Anthony Skeffington

Mr. Joyce has made the point I was going to make. A great deal of work has been done in this area over the past number of years. We have taken in charge 252 out of 299 schemes. Many of those would have been what we call orphan schemes, with no committees involved, but we are continuing to work towards getting the remaining schemes taken in charge as quickly as possible.

A lot of work is being done in the background on this, and especially on debt write off and those challenges.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Did Mr. Finnegan want to add to that? No.

Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh

I really need to ask that this be speeded up. I acknowledge that some work has been done, but I really want to get these off my desk. I want people to be able to get on with their lives and have access to water. It is not an excuse to be passed from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage to the local authority to Irish Water and back again. This is what has been happening. I ask the witnesses to take note of it from here today.

I want to bring up the issue about the cyberattack on the group water schemes, and on our own group water scheme last week, where in the shed or the pump house, a message which said "You have been hacked" appeared on the display board. It was because the equipment is Israeli. Apparently the message came from an Iranian group. How vulnerable are we? I have written to the Minister and the Tánaiste in respect of this matter. How vulnerable are our utilities to cyberattacks? What assistance can be given? I would expect that Irish Water has a system that is really protected but there is no point in keeping that to yourselves? Is Irish Water willing to share this with group water schemes and others that may be vulnerable in the delivery of water and other utilities?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

On that point, from a group scheme perspective, we would not have sight of that and we would not have had knowledge of that incident or similar ones. As the Deputy has referenced, within Uisce Éireann we have a cyber team in our IT set up who are actively working on developing our cyber capabilities and protection and so on. With regard to Uisce Éireann sharing knowledge from that perspective, we can certainly come back on that. We will go back to our colleagues on the matter. I do not see any reason why we could not open a conversation on that.

Senator Rose Conway-Walsh

Please do that as a matter of urgency. You can imagine people walking in and discovering that a system has been hacked. The same houses that had been without electricity for the week before have no water again on this occasion. It was the first time it has come to my attention that we are so vulnerable to cyberattacks. We may expect it on the HSE and previously on other things but here we have a rural group water scheme in remote Belmullet being impacted by such global events. I know there were similar hacks carried out in Pennsylvania and some other areas of the United States of America. It requires that all of the equipment we use for utilities is checked in this way.

There are many other questions but I really appreciate the committee letting me in to ask this. Please can we focus on getting water to rural areas. On the treatment plant and the raw sewage we are charging businesses in places like Newport in Mayo for putting raw sewage out into Clew Bay. That is really wrong in this day and age.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I thank Deputy Conway-Walsh.

Senator Mark Wall

I welcome our guests here today. I have a couple of questions about average connection times for the ESB and for Uisce Éireann. Deputy Ó Cuív mentioned the 16 weeks for connection with Uisce Éireann but can we get specific dates in relation to average connection and especially for rural once-off houses? What are the average connection times at the moment for the ESB and Uisce Éireann? Related to that, is there a contact details for public representatives to inquire about that as well? It is very important if something comes up on a regular basis.

Going back to the initial opening statement by the Chair in relation to rural villages, small villages and wastewater connections. This has been a huge problem in the area where I live in south Kildare. When I was a councillor, it came up regularly. I want to put a question to our guests as well. What is the timeframe for a number of them? I want to be parochial about this, specifically in the context of the Allenwood wastewater network improvement scheme in county Kildare. We had a very positive reply from Uisce Éireann last week that the connection would start in the second quarter. Can we get confirmation that this is going to happen? We have had a number of outages in that particular area of county Kildare in the recent past. A number of schools have had to close as result of that, which is obviously not good. If that confirmation could be given, it would be appreciated.

In south Kildare, in the villages of Timolin and Moone, as the chair as referenced, there is raw sewage running down the streets. This is not acceptable. What are Irish Water and the Departments doing to combat that? It is essential for these villages and their futures that this is combatted as quickly as possible.

I must also mention the sceptic tank grant. I am aware that this comes under the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, but I regularly get queries about it. The grant was increased in January. Perhaps I could get a comment from Uisce Éireann on the importance of that. Obviously there are water courses and so on all around and throughout rural Ireland that may or may not be affected by septic tanks and the upgrading of such. I know this is not directly for our guests because it relates to housing, but I would like to hear their views on the importance of that grant and how it should be rolled out as much as possible to rural Ireland. I welcome the increase in the amount involved.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I thank the Senator for his questions. I will start by taking some of the questions relating to Uisce Éireann, particularly those in respect of wastewater. First, I will address the connection inquiries and the key performance indicators, KPIs. The Senator asked how long it takes. We are working to two KPI metrics where we are measured on the time it takes to respond to these connection inquiries. All the teams that work on these inquiries internally also have our internal metrics that we work to. That is absolutely information we can provide to the committee on how we are meeting those KPIs, which we also report to our regulator.

The Senator referred to rural villages, including Allenwood, and the water issue. I will pass that across to Mr. Joyce in a moment. Timolin is wastewater issue, which is part of the small towns and villages growth programme. That project is progressing. We will come back with details of where it is currently. I believe it is in stage 2, which means we are looking at the viable options and conducting feasibility studies to bring it to stage 3, which is detailed design, planning and tendering. The project is progressing.

The Senator also asked about septic tanks. As he mentioned, the issue of septic tanks across the country is not within our remit. Approximately 25% of the population of Ireland is served by individual units such as septic tanks. Uisce Éireann is responsible for wastewater for about 75% of the population. We are engaging quite a bit with the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, and with the local authority waters programme office, LAWPRO, from a water quality perspective. The urban wastewater system, which is the category Uisce Éireann is responsible for, has been identified as having significant pressure on it. It is now 197 water bodies, and we know that domestic units are also having pressure in the context of a number of water bodies. I do not have the number to hand but certainly we were putting in a huge amount of investment on the urban wastewater side to address these pressures on the receiving waters. We have a plan for that, which we are including in the basin management plan being published by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

Any work that is done by the other stakeholders that is also impacting on receiving waters has to be welcomed. We believe that the best opportunity is when we bring the different stakeholders together to address the pressures that are on particular water bodies. Uisce Éireann can spend any amount money on addressing wastewater issues relating to a particular water body, but if the other stakeholders are not involved, then the state of that water body will not necessarily improve. If there is additional grant funding for septic tanks it has to be welcomed. I will now pass over to my colleague on Allenwood and the water.

Mr. Des Joyce

I do not have the specifics on Allenwood but I will commit to getting the details and we will come back to the committee with an update on that.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I will also ask the ESB to respond to Senator Wall's question.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

There were two questions for us. One was about points of contact. We will provide points of contact. We have a national customer contact centre for any kind of customer queries and where we deal with those. It is based in Wilton but operates nationally. Our head of public affairs can be contacted by public representatives and we will provide the contact details after today's meeting. We also have area managers that are based right across the country who also can be contacted.

Again, we will provide the details after the meeting.

The second question was on how we measure our performance in terms of "time to quote" and "time to connect" for connections to the electricity network. I will pass over to my colleague, Mr. Rossiter, to give more information on our urban and rural connections in that regard.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

On domestic single houses, which is rural housing, we have two metrics. The first is what we call "time to quote". That is the time from the application until the time the customer receives the quotation. The average across all those types of connections is 10.4 days. It must be noted that where someone is applying for a standard connection within that subset, that is, a 12 kVA or 16 kVA connection, turnaround times are much faster because they are able to be quoted from our team in Wilton. The vast majority of houses fall into that bracket. Regarding "time to connect", once the customer has received confirmation regarding ducting and registration with the supplier, including the certificate, the average number of days to connect after that point is 11.8. The figures I have provided apply from January to the end of October of this year.

I can give other figures in relation to scheme houses, which is a collection of two or more houses. The time to quote for that cohort is 31 days and the time to connect is 6.8 days from the receipt of the duct, certification and registration. On apartment premises where there are no mixed developments, our time to quote is 24 days and our time to connect for that cohort is 10.4 days.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Is the Senator satisfied with those answers?

Senator Mark Wall

Yes. I will come back in if I have any more questions.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I will try to be as focused as I can. Could ESB Networks confirm if all domestic customers who put up solar panels are guaranteed they will get a connection to the grid and will be able find someone to buy their surplus electricity?

My second question is to Uisce Éireann. Some 10% of houses in the State do not have a water supply from Uisce Éireann or a high-quality group scheme. That is an amazing number. They are dependent on private supplies, streams, wells, etc. Would Uisce Éireann be supportive of a plan, similar to the roll-out of fibre broadband, that would set about providing water to every house and premises in the country, as we did with electricity and are doing with broadband?

On the islands, could Uisce Éireann outline what plans it has to generate a resilient water supply to all islands? For example, from early spring to late autumn, depending on the weather, Inis Oírr has perennial problems with water supply. These have been going on year after year. Uisce Éireann is bringing tankers of water to the island on boats, which is costing a fortune. Does Uisce Éireann have a plan to deal with that issue?

My next question is a wider one which also involves the Department. Was consideration given to the feasibility of connecting the Aran Islands to the mainland via a pipe that would be laid at the same time as fibre is installed and, probably, another stronger electricity cable is laid? That would give some resilience in the event that we have a repeat of what happened previously when the cable was ripped up by a private operator. In Inishbofin, Uisce Éireann has had huge problems with water supply, which has been unavailable for long periods, although it was not as bad this year. We need resilience on the islands.

This takes me to the big question where the islands and Uisce Éireann interface, namely, sewage. On the islands, there is a tiny scheme that Uisce Éireann has inherited by accident or by way of a court case because the EPA got involved. The plant, at Kilronan, services seven houses. There is another small private scheme that serviced the public toilet, for which Uisce Éireann now has responsibility. Under the present regime, does Uisce Éireann see any possibility of providing the whole village of Kilronan with a wastewater service?

As regards the island of Inis Oírr, which has a very high population for a very small island, are there plans to provide a wastewater facility there? This is where the islands fund comes in. To go back to the old problem of cost-benefit analysis, would it change Uisce Éireann's attitude to getting on with these jobs if, for example, the Department with responsibility for the islands, as it often did with infrastructure in the past, stated it would provide 50% of the cost if Uisce Éireann provided the other 50% of the cost? Would that encourage Uisce Éireann to get on with this fundamental infrastructure?

For the islands section, the islands fund was used in the past for myriad infrastructure deficits. In fact, when any infrastructure deficits came our way, we just dealt with them. An example of that was when ESB Networks was willing to put in the distribution networks on small islands and the Department footed the bill for the undersea cable from the point on the mainland to the point on the island. I would like to see this being done. We did water and electricity on Gola Island at the same time. We should do water and electricity, as well as installing a fibre cable, or at least ducting for a cable, at the same time. Is that kind of adventurous spirit still alive in the Department's islands division? If not, the national policies will just not work on the basis that the islands will always be at the bottom of the pile in the cost-benefit analyses because the population, by definition, will be constrained. Population-wise, the biggest island we have is Inis Mór, which has a population of 800. The next biggest one is Árainn Mhór, which is very near the mainland and has a population of 500. The next one is Inis Oírr, which has 300 people. The island population is, therefore, small.

I have a question for the Department of Rural and Community Development on CLÁR funding. In the past, the CLÁR funds could be combined with the island funds for sewage schemes. On the mainland and the islands, CLÁR funding for some sewage schemes was provided on a 50:50 basis. We never used it on the islands at the time as it was not a big pressure point. The money was mainly used for piers and electricity. There was a scheme, and this relates to Uisce Éireann and the mainland, which the Department funds. It provides Uisce Éireann with funding for wastewater systems in unsewered towns and villages, which Uisce Éireann then provides. Small villages in the CLÁR areas and the islands lose out on this funding on the basis of size and we are getting back into the issue of the size of an area, such as Craughwell, Clarinbridge, etc. Could the Department of Rural and Community Development establish a 50:50 fund for CLÁR areas under which it would provide 50% of the funding for the provision of small sewage schemes in CLÁR areas specifically? These are areas where there has been a 30% loss in population since 1926. Would that be seen as an attractive prospect to try to ensure that these small places get a scheme? As I said, we need to be disruptive here.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

These are all very small but interesting asks.

I might put the points to Irish Water first.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta as ucht na gceisteanna There were a number of points for Uisce Éireann on water and wastewater. I might start by setting out the terms on which we operate in the asset base that we cover and the legislation that has been put in place for the establishment of Uisce Éireann. Based on the rules under which we operate, we can only invest in public assets that have been vested to us by the Minister. Where public assets do not exist, it is not within our remit to invest capital expenditure on those areas.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

But if land gets zoned, Uisce Éireann does build out.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

As part of an extension of an existing agglomeration.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Yes, but Uisce Éireann is still building out.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

A lot of the extension of the network is being covered through dedicated growth programmes such as the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, and major urban housing development sites, MUHDS, which are being provided by the Department.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

So Uisce Éireann can build out, sometimes with its own money and sometimes with the Department's money. Could Uisce Éireann build out a water scheme?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I will hand over to Mr. Joyce to respond about the water scheme.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

This is just wastewater.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

The bigger area in terms of this conversation to my mind is the unserviced areas, the unsewered settlements and villages that currently do not have a wastewater network or they may have a combination of private developments such as the DPI I mentioned earlier. Those areas are in focus from the perspective of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. We referenced measure 8 of the rural water programme, which the Department administers. The local authorities would have applied to the Department for funding to establish new sewers and treatment plants where they did not exist before in villages. We are supportive of that. When the funding is put through, we have committed to take those on, as we have discussed previously.

Similar to what was mentioned earlier, in any scenario where we take in charge group schemes, where assets are in a certain condition and meet certain standards then the taking in charge and taking responsibility for those has been part of the process we have been following in recent years. I do not see a big concern in terms of that approach.

The Deputy mentioned the wastewater system in Kilronan. I can address that here today also. There is a small wastewater system treating wastewater from a small number of houses currently on the outskirts of the village of Kilronan. We continue to operate that and we recently carried out maintenance on it to improve its performance. However, it only covers a small number of houses.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

That is right; council houses.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

As the Deputy mentioned, there is a separate system within the village itself, which is servicing the public toilets, and we believe one or two properties also. We have taken that on as a project. We are moving through stage 1 of the project, over a four-stage process where we look at all the potential viable options and then we start a process of assessing those options and doing an appraisal to ensure that the most appropriate option is picked.

There are also going to be a lot of complexities in getting that project to the end, not least in terms of how much it is going to cost. It will be very expensive, but we will confirm that. Other issues include land availability; where there is groundwater discharge, for example and; whether we need a long sea outfall and then we are into the marine area consenting piece and all of that type of thing. There is quite a road to travel on that, but we have started the process.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Uisce Éireann is in the lower part of the village. It is a very microscopic part of what is a reasonably conglomerated settlement. Would it help the job considerably if there was a 50:50 offer from the Department of Rural and Community Development to encourage Uisce Éireann along the road? I am just being pragmatic about it. The witnesses have to sell it to their bosses.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

Yes, for sure. I think we have a commitment made in terms of addressing this specific issue. Where the challenge will come ultimately is-----

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I am talking about doing a proper job. If those two micro schemes had not been there, Mr. O'Reilly would be telling me it would not be done.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I suppose I would be directing the Deputy down the rural water programme route. That is correct.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

We have the schemes, but they are microscopic compared to the size of the village. They are legacy issues that Uisce Éireann inherited in a variety of ways, including court cases.

Obviously we will be expecting the Department to provide money. It would take considerable money to put a new sewer into Kilronan. It would cost a lot less money to just upgrade the existing infrastructure. Would a little present help Uisce Éireann or encourage it to undertake the work?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

What I would say is that the practice of extending sewers on roads at the edge of a conglomeration is not generally speaking something that we would do unless there is a connection request.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I do not know if Mr. O'Reilly knows Kilronan.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I have been there relatively recently.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

The schemes are on the edge of the village. The irony of it is that the centre of the village does not have sewerage. It is perverse but that is the way it happened for historic reasons. We are not talking about stretching half way across to Mainistir or Cill Éinne, we are talking about doing the core of the village and around it, as it is quite agglomerated. I refer to the part that is not sewered at the moment.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

That is correct.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

We might come back to Mr. O'Reilly on that again another day as I do not want to hold up the meeting. I thank him for the information. I think he sees where I am coming from.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

I do indeed.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

My experience is that it all comes down to money in the end.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

There are one or two more items outstanding.

Mr. Des Joyce

In response to the suggestions on broadband, if Government policy changes and we are asked to participate in the scheme, I am sure that can happen.

In terms of extending networks into unpiped areas, at this moment in time the community water schemes were set up to address that. They come to Uisce Éireann for a connection. A good example of joined-up thinking is the project that is currently about to start construction at Murrisk. Between Westport and Louisburgh there is a 22 km area that has no piped supply at all. Many people would find that hard to believe. The community has got together and requested a community water scheme. They have sought permission from Uisce Éireann for water, which we will provide to them. We will increase the capacity of Lough Mask to supply them. In addition to that, Uisce Éireann is going to look to increase the pipe size through the community water scheme in order that we can rationalise Louisburgh, which is at the end of the line. That is a good model.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

We did that in Camas years ago.

Mr. Des Joyce

It is a good model. In terms of the question on the islands, we spoke about this back in June. At the moment, 11 islands have their own supply. We carried out a 25-year study of natural water resources. That told us about the challenges for providing water on those islands. A feasibility study is being advanced in the three Aran Islands, Inishbofin, and Whiddy Island in Cork to determine the best solution. I am sure we will be in contact with our ESB Network colleagues about the undersea pipeline option, because that will be considered along with other options such desalination and raw water storage, etc. That is moving ahead but it will take a couple of years to determine.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

That is great news. There was also a question for ESB Networks.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I will come back to that after Mr. Nicholson's contribution.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

Before I start, I will add the caveat that I am speaking to overall rural policy. I would caution that I am perhaps getting into the area of the line responsibility of other Departments.

I will start with an anecdote. I live 2 km up an old boreen myself and I was extremely happy to be able to get a grant to cover the full cost of water facilities from Limerick County Council, with very little bureaucracy.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Is it a one-off house?

Mr. Robert Nicholson

Yes, it is a one-off house.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Did the county council give Mr. Nicholson a grant?

Mr. Robert Nicholson

Yes, for water and filtration.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I wish I was living in County Limerick rather than County Galway.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

There was very little bureaucracy. I was quite happy with that.

In terms of the overall policy approach for housing, I note that somewhere around 25% of all homes are one-off housing. It is not divided into rural or urban, but we do know the majority of homes built in rural communities are not developer led and are one-off. In terms of the supports that are available to those, irrespective of the Department, there are various grants at the moment for the delivery of housing such as the help-to-buy, first home, funding for septic tanks and so on.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

There is no septic tank grant.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

I am sorry, I meant for digging a well, the one I just referred to.

In developing any new scheme, a scheme that seeks to provide some sort of selective advantage or address a particular disadvantage has to be carefully calibrated in terms of the income levels of the households who might benefit from it.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Coming from Dublin 4, I never saw an income calibration being done on the new wastewater infrastructure in Dublin.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

Where somebody is going to benefit from an intervention that another household will not benefit from, it needs to be carefully calibrated. Obviously, colleagues in the-----

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I only suggested public infrastructure.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

I presume it will be public infrastructure that benefits a particular community in the context of having to pay things like service charges, development levies, etc.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

We are talking about putting a public pipe under a public road.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

That is subvented by the State. The issue is that any funding, irrespective of whether it is the Department of Rural and Community Development or the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, would need to be carefully calibrated and thought about in terms of what it is trying to achieve.

In terms of the funds available to the Department of Rural and Community Development, the Deputy mentioned CLÁR. That is a flexible enough fund and it is relatively small in regard to the overall amounts.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

How small is it? It used to be €20 million.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

It is €8 million for 2023.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

€8 million.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

It is flexible. It provides supports for sports facilities and youth clubs.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Would the Department not be able to get it back to where it was at about €20 million?

Mr. Robert Nicholson

As I said, it is €8 million for 2023. In the overall scheme of things, in terms of the Department's funding and its capability to invest in infrastructure, infrastructure is very expensive and generally dealt with through the line Department. That is for good reason, particularly as the line Department has specific expertise and intelligence in the area of utilities. In terms of public policy and the way rural policy operates, line Departments generally take responsibility for the funding that is provided for particular infrastructure that is put in place.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Surely the role of the rural development Department is to be, as I described it earlier, disruptive of the vertical approach within the State. The whole idea of a crosscutting Department was to cut across all of the anomalies caused by the vertical structure of the State, which creates totally wasteful resource use by having all of these schools and community facilities just lumped with more people. They do not need more people or massive new housing schemes. What they need is a little investment. My understanding of the rural development Department is that it was to be disruptive in this regard, and that it would put in the lateral money rather than the vertical money.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

I would argue that it is disruptive and it has funds available to take particular initiatives.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

It has not done much on infrastructure recently. It is more town infrastructure than rural infrastructure.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

Yes. Again, there is good reason for the policy position that has been taken to allow the parent Departments, which are responsible for things like broadband, wastewater infrastructure, water infrastructure and electricity, to hold line responsibility for that because of the associated capital costs and the expertise that is required to oversee it. Personally, without having any particular policy proposal in front of us, I would be cautious about taking that remit outside the parent Department given the amount of funds that are associated with it. You would not be able to do it for small money.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I did not suggest that. What I am suggesting is that the Department would use everybody else's expertise but that it would put in side funding. I will give an example. We had a scheme going where the county councils put in new wastewater systems. We went fifty-fifty, but we had no technical input and we left that to the parent Department. The scheme was under the group water schemes, as they were known at the time, and I think it was called the community connection scheme or something like that. Basically, we topped up the grant from the Department of housing and environment at the time, and we made sure the householder did not have to pay more than €1,200 for a water connection. However, we did not have any involvement, as a Department, when those schemes were going to the other Department, and no involvement in the technical specification as that was for the county council and the other Department. It was the same with health facilities. Everything was done on the basis that the parent Department was left with the technical job and what we had to do was provide the money. It was done and there was no problem doing it.

Mr. Nicholson can check out the models that were operating from 2000 to 2010 and he will see that there was very little technical work. For example, with ESB, we provided a 100% grant for business networks to change from single phase to three phase. It was a very successful programme and, of course, it made the lines more resilient because they were all upgraded at the time, which was very effective. It has been done. The model is there. Perhaps we could have a fuller discussion on this. The Department can check the models that were operating and we can then come back and have a discussion on this.

Mr. Robert Nicholson

I will close on this point. I am shooting a little blind because I have not seen a policy proposal in terms of what is envisaged, the scope or the relative cost. My main point is that if there is any proposal in respect of a scheme that involves a significant capital cost, and I do not know what that is without having seen anything, my gut reaction would be that it stays with the parent Department for good reason. If we are talking about some sort of discretionary fund, the Department of rural affairs reviews the uses of its funds almost on a yearly basis. Anything would be considered in that context with regard to a formal submission. The Minister indicated a couple of weeks ago at this committee that those considerations could be taken into account but, presumably, it needs some sort of formal policy proposal.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

I want to come back to the question of microgeneration for rooftops. Some 76,000 customers have now registered under this scheme. We have seen massive growth in the last 12 months and microgeneration for rooftop solar is up about 85%. I will comment on the process. What customers do when they have solar PV panels installed is that they submit an NC6 form that demonstrates to us that the equipment has been installed by a registered installer. Once that form is processed, and it is done on what is called an inform-and-fit basis, it is then automated by us and the details are provided to the electricity supply company that the customer has a relationship with, so they get a credit for the export from those solar panels.

Of course, that dovetails with our smart metering programme. At this stage, we have installed over 1.5 million smart meters and people are able to see their usage and their export out to the distribution network. There are no restrictions, as things stand. If we were to fast forward on the scale of this, I think it has the potential to be a big contributor towards the climate action targets and it gives more control around use and self-generation for customers. As this scales up in the years ahead, and it is continuing to grow at a huge pace, we are monitoring the network at a low voltage level to see where we need to invest on a proactive basis and also a reactive basis.

As things stand, it is on an inform-and-fit basis so there are no restrictions on people putting in solar panels.

Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta. Mar a luaigh an tAire, an Teachta Humphreys, nuair a bhí sí anseo cúpla seachtaine ó shin, faoi scéim CLÁR, go bhféadfaí é sin a úsáid le tuilleadh airgid a fháil ón na Ranna atá freagrach. Is dóigh go bhféadfaí an cur chuige céanna a úsáid a bhaineann leis an airgead caipitil atá ann do na hoileáin faoi láthair agus le cúpla bliain anuas agus is ar na bóithre, na céanna, agus mar sin go príomha a bhí an bhéim. Tháinig laghdú thar na mblianta ar an mbuiséid caipitil le hais deich nó b’fhéidir 15 déag ó shin nuair a bhí na hoibreacha eile a bhí an Teachta ag caint air, ag tarlú. Is cinnte, le cúpla bliain anuas, gur cuireadh an bhéim ar na mion-oibreacha leis na comhairlí contae ach go háirithe. Le dhá bhliain nó trí bliana anuas áfach, tá go leor infheistíochta déanta san aerfort i gConamara agus sna haerfoirt ar na hoileáin chomh maith céanna. Agus an polasaí foilsithe anois, táimid ag breathnú ar na háiteanna eile agus na deiseanna eile. Mar a luaigh an tAire, má tá deis ann an t-airgead atá againn a úsáid chun spreagadh a thabhairt do Ranna eile a gcuid dualgais a chomhlíonadh agus teacht chun cinn le scéimeanna, beimid sásta labhairt leo agus féachaint ar aon phleananna atá acu chuige sin.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Más féidir liom teacht isteach ansin. Tá brú ama orainn mar tá cruinniú príobháideach againn freisin.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Shíl mé mar rannóg na n-oileán go mbeadh sí ar an talamh ag fáil na bhfadhbanna agus ag gabháil - ní ag fanacht - ach ag gabháil chuig na heagrais eile ag rá go bhfuil an fhadhb seo le huisce nó le séarachas ann, go gaithfear é a réiteach agus gurb é seo an méid atá an rannóg sásta a chur isteach sa phota chun déileáil leis an bhfadhb seo le seirbhísí fisiciúla sláintiúla agus mar sin de. Bheadh an rannóg ag gabháil chuig na heagrais ag tairiscint seachas a bheith ag fanacht go dtiocfadh iad siúd chuig an rannóg. Níl sé mar thosaíocht acu siúd ach tá sé mar chéad tosaíocht ag rannóg na n-oileán. Feictear dom gurb é sin an difríocht atá ann. Ar ndóigh, tá i bhfad níos lú airgid ag an rannóg agus caithfear an t-airgead a mhéadú, ach ní airgead mór atá i gceist. Dá mbeadh €20 milliún sa bhliain ag an rannóg, bheadh sí ag déanamh togha na hoibre agus chlúdódh sé chuile shórt, céanna agus a leithéid. Teastaíonn an infheistíocht, agus mar sin, ar na hoileáin. Má táimid ag gabháil ag coinneáil pobail inmharthana bhuana ar na hoileáin, teastófar cineál infheistíochta mar sin.

Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle

Nuair a bhí an comhairliúchán ar siúl againn don pholasaí, chuamar chuig na Ranna éagsúla ag iarraidh a chinntiú go mbeidís páirteach anois sa phróiseas seo agus sa pholasaí. Mar a tharlaíonn, beidh an chéad chruinniú den choiste monatóireachta don pholasaí ann amárach, agus as seo amach beimid ag gabháil ar ais chuig na Ranna agus chuig na heagraíochtaí eile leis na héilimh sin atá ag teacht ó na hoileáin féachaint chun a chinntiú go gcuirfear i bhfeidhm rud éigin.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Uasal Mac an Mhíle.

Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Go raibh maith agat. I call Senator Burke.

Senator Paddy Burke

This is a very helpful debate and has been so for the past two and a half hours. Heretofore, years ago, if there was a need for an extension to a wastewater treatment plant or water services, the local authority put forward a plan and the Department funded it, if it saw fit to do so. The Minister probably signed off on that. How is it possible to now get an extension to the wastewater infrastructure for small towns or villages, or even those that are larger? How are such works put forward? Who puts them forward? Is there an evaluation process in Uisce Éireann or the Department, or how does the whole process work? I ask this because I am mystified as to how an extension can be got to a sewerage scheme or a water scheme.

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

The process that is followed to extend an existing wastewater scheme would be the new connections process within Uisce Éireann. That looks at any inquiries that come in. For an extension to occur in that regard in individual settlements, a group of interested parties needs to come together or submit a proposal themselves through the pre-connection inquiry process. That is then assessed within Uisce Éireann and an answer is given on that request.

In such a scenario, the capital costs for the extension are borne by the customers. This is the way it works. Reference was made to zoned land. I mentioned that there are programmes such as the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, and the major urban housing delivery, MUHD, through which we receive funding from the local authorities to extend our networks to the zoned lands to ensure they are serviced. There are probably two different scenarios here. One is where an existing network is being extended along a road. This is again done through the new connections process. The second is servicing zoned land, and this being done through the dedicated funding programmes in place.

Senator Paddy Burke

I am still mystified, I think. Does the local authority have any say in this? Does the local authority put a plan or proposal to Uisce Éireann? If a developer wants to develop an area and the water and wastewater services needed are not available, does he go to Uisce Éireann or does he go through the local authority? How does the whole process work?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

In the scenario of a developer looking to connect to the network, in effect, that developer would come through the new connection process. The developer makes a pre-connection inquiry to Uisce Éireann. All the information and proposals are provided in terms of the scale of the development and its nature. Uisce Éireann assesses that from a technical perspective in respect of whether we have the capacity in the network locally and the capacity in the receiving treatment plant to treat the new load that would arise. We would then give an indication of the cost involved. This information would go back to the proposer, the developer in this case, and the developer would assess this and determine whether it was viable to continue with the project.

Senator Paddy Burke

If the capacity is not there, is there Government aid to do it or does the developer have to cough up the cost of upgrading the system to facilitate extra development?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

Again this is covered through several policies approved by our regulator, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities. In terms of where a developer is driving a need for investment, namely, where a wastewater treatment plant does not have the capacity to deal with this new load resulting from a proposed development, then there would be an upgrade requirement that is being driven by that developer. This is part of the assessment and the estimate that goes back to the developer.

If an existing upgrade is already under way when we upgrade our wastewater treatment plants, and, indeed, the same for the water side of things, we look at a time horizon of ten, 15 and 20 years, and we use the national planning framework as our guide in terms of growth rate. We engage with the planning authorities, we understand the growth aspirations through the county development plans and this is what we build to. Where the upgrade is taking place and the capacity is being realised through that upgrade, it then comes down to the planning authority, as it grants planning permissions, to in effect determine if those are within the growth targets for that settlement. It can be imagined that if we were to build a wastewater treatment plant, it would likely have a 25-year design horizon capacity available. The planning authority, typically, would not give all that capacity to one application because that would consume the total growth for that settlement over that time.

Senator Paddy Burke

If there is a village that has no sewerage or wastewater provision, who would put forward a proposal in that regard? Would it be the local authorities? How does Uisce Éireann receive the inquiry? Who then decides if the work should go ahead and who should bear the cost of it?

Mr. Ted O'Reilly

At present, regarding the servicing of unserviced or unsewered settlements, it is for the local authority to put together a proposal. That is then submitted to the Department under the rural water programme. The Department has a new measure, No. 8, concerning servicing unserviced or unsewered settlements from a wastewater perspective. The Department has a fund in that regard. Once the proposal is processed and a decision has been made as to which of the schemes move forward, we have agreed with the Department that we will be involved in the building of those schemes and we will take them on once they are complete.

Senator Paddy Burke

To Mr. Joyce, I pose a question concerning the likes of the situation in Murrisk and Louisburgh. When the extension to Murrisk is done, Louisburgh comes in after that. Is that what is being said? It is in the pipeline now. Is it the Government that funds that, is it the local authority, or how is it funded?

Mr. Des Joyce

The funding of the community water scheme, which concerns the 600 houses in Murrisk would be funded through the rural water section in the Department.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Just sit into the microphone a small bit, please, Mr. Joyce.

Mr. Des Joyce

I am sorry. The funding for the community element of the Murrisk scheme will come through the rural water section in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. Regarding extending that service provision to Louisburgh and increasing the pipe size through the Murrisk scheme, that aspect will be funded through Uisce Éireann. This will allow for the connection of Louisburgh to the Lough Mask regional water supply scheme eventually.

Senator Paddy Burke

Is there a timeframe for that?

Mr. Des Joyce

The community water element of this project, as far as I know, and this is not really under my control, is due to start in early 2024. Uisce Éireann is already working on the design feasibility of the element that would extend this service to Louisburgh.

Senator Paddy Burke

I thank Mr. Joyce. Are any grants available for district heating systems? Who evaluates whether a scheme is eligible to be joined up through ESB Networks? Is the heat exported or must there be batteries? How do the district heating systems work? Is ESB Networks in favour of them?

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

First, I have to say I am not an expert in district heating. When it comes to electricity, our role is really around electricity connections in this regard. If we take the concept of district heating, it is about the provision of heat that can be transferred around a community. One scenario concerns a scheme that is producing heat through the generation of electricity, that is, the heat is being produced as part of that process, or from a waste plant or something similar that generates heat in the community.

That is perhaps outside the ESB networks. If electrical connections are involved, we are certainly available to support any work around connecting the projects to the network. In Ireland, the level of district heating has not progressed as it has in other countries. The Department or others here might be able to comment on that further.

Senator Paddy Burke

The other part of that issue is domestic wind turbines. There are very few in Ireland. It should be an area of growth, but it does not seem to be. I wonder why no one has taken the bull by the horns and said we have an abundance of wind and we do not have any small domestic wind turbines.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

Looking at the history of the industry and development of onshore wind energy, I note it has involved larger projects. The growth of renewables in the past 25 or 30 years has concentrated on wind and in recent years there has been a huge growth in solar energy. If we look back over that period, what has happened with solar is that the cost of solar photovoltaic, PV, panels has come down significantly, making them affordable for customers. The 76,000 microgeneration customers I referred to earlier are predominantly using solar energy. I presume that comes back to the cost benefit and the convenience of being able to put the panels on rooftops. They are probably the biggest factors. There are some small wind turbines, but the numbers are low. It is because solar technology is dominant and due to the cost benefit of installing the panels.

Senator Paddy Burke

Is it because there is a grant for solar panels but there does not seem to be any grant for domestic wind turbines? I do not think there is anyway.

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

I am not familiar with how the grants work for the different technologies, but the results are dominated by solar energy. It is probably because the panels are relatively easy to install on rooftops. There is a convenience factor. The technology is now being deployed at scale.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I will ask one or two brief questions. As I do not represent a rural constituency, perhaps I do not have as much experience as some of the other Deputies in dealing with some of these issues.

Is le hAodán Mac an Mhíle an chéad cheist atá agam. Táimid ag caint faoi chuid mhaith de na hábhair seo ó thaobh fuinnimh, uisce agus gach rud eile mar táimid ag smaoineamh ar phobail, go mórmhór ar na hoileáin ach ní amháin ar na hoileáin, ina bhfuil an daonra íseal agus ina bhfuil constaicí roimh dhaoine atá ag tógáil a gcuid teaghlaigh agus roimh fhás an phobail. Sa chomhthéacs sin, táimid ag caint faoi fhorbairt, fás agus cosaint an daonra. Cé nach mbaineann sé go díreach le fuinneamh ná le huisce, tá roinnt constaicí ann ó thaobh tógáil ar na hoileáin agus go mórmhór ó thaobh lastais farantóireachta. Tá sé sin costasach. An bhfuil liúntas i gcomhair lastas ar na báid farantóireachta taobh amuigh den liúntas i leith iompar daoine?

Mr. Aodán Mac an Mhíle

Tá thart ar 20 conradh farantóireachta san iomlán ag an Roinn seo ag freastal ar na hoileáin amach ón gcósta. Cuimsíonn sé sin báid farantóireachta do phaisinéirí agus báid lastais chomh maith céanna. Tá seirbhísí lastais ag freastal ar nach mór na hoileáin ar fad. Tá fóirdheontas á íoc leis na farantóirí sin leis na seirbhísí a reáchtáil. Tá táillí éagsúla leagtha amach do na hábhair éagsúla a bhíonn á n-iompar ar na seirbhísí sin. Toisc go mbíonn ábhair tógála, ola, ábhair éadroma agus gach sórt ábhar eile i gceist, tá réimse praghsanna ag baint leis na seirbhísí sin.

Tá geallúint tugtha againn mar Roinn sa pholasaí Ár nOileáin Bheo go ndéanfaimid athbhreithniú ar an struchtúr praghsála a bhíonn ar na conarthaí lastais mar is ábhar é sin a tháinig aníos go mór tríd an bpróiseas comhairliúcháin leis na hoileáin. De réir mar atá conarthaí anois ag teacht aníos le hathnuachan, táimid ag breathnú ar an praghasliosta atá ann agus ag labhairt leis na hoileánaí le féachaint céard iad na brúphointí atá acu. Cheana féin, tá athnuachan déanta againn ar an gconradh lastais do na hOileáin Árann le cúpla mí anuas agus bhí ábhair bhruscair agus athchúrsála luaite go mór. Bíonn costas mór ag baint leis na scipeanna a thabhairt isteach chuig na hoileáin agus fáil réidh le bruscar ar na hoileáin. Is é an chaoi ina n-oibríonn an praghasliosta atá againn ná go bhfuil uaschostas i gceist. Rinne muid laghdú air sin ó thaobh na scipeanna bruscair agus athchúrsála. Dá réir, tá costas níos ísle anois ar na hoileánaí ó thaobh a gcuid ábhair bruscair. Is é sin cad a dhéarfainn air. Tá geallúint tugtha againn go ndéanfaimid athbhreithniú iomlán. Beidh próiseas ar bun againn le Comhdháil na nOileán le breathnú air sin.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I have a few questions for Mr Finnegan. I do not have questions for the other organisations. I had the benefit of a lengthy meeting with local Irish Water representatives recently so any questions I had were answered there. Given that I am critical of Irish Water, to be fair, I will acknowledge that the investment in the system in Cork has been substantial in the past four or five years and we are seeing the benefits.

I acknowledge the ESB apprenticeship programme. I was at the WorldSkills demonstration last year, where I spoke to someone from the ESB about its impressive apprenticeship programme, which is important. There are many public bodies, including local authorities, that need to do a lot more in offering apprenticeships for people to have alternatives. I was previously on the education and skills committee. We need to start thinking about the fact it is not necessarily a choice between university and apprenticeships and that the two can be perfectly well integrated. People can move back and forth and do different bits and pieces over the course of their lives. I acknowledge it is an impressive programme.

I thank the commission for its attendance and for the work it does, which is crucial to keeping everything running. It might have a comment to make on some of my questions, though they are primarily directed at the Department.

On the RESS, in my locality there is a fair bit of discussion about the potential for offshore wind energy and particularly floating wind energy generation. There is a fear, and 95% of industry experts are of the view, that we will miss the 2030 target of 80% of our energy coming from renewable sources. The RESS 3 cleared the smallest amounts at the highest price ever and there is a fear of the renewable pipeline running a bit thin. I am aware that some companies looking at floating offshore energy feel that progress is so far off that they have now diverted resources to non-Irish projects. That includes companies that are based here. That is a concern. There is a feeling we are moving too slowly and too cautiously in the floating offshore space and that is reflected in the RESS and other areas. Perhaps Mr. Finnegan would comment on that.

In addition, will Mr. Finnegan comment on the planning obstacles? Perhaps the Planning and Development Bill will address some of this. The average waiting time for a decision is 92 weeks. It is meant to be 18 weeks and some of the RESS contracts are timing out because the grid connection cannot be secured on time. That is a concern. I welcome the small-scale renewable electricity support scheme, SRESS. It makes sense because community projects seem to find it difficult to access the RESS. Perhaps Mr. Finnegan would address the issues around planning and the RESS. The SRESS will take off at the start of the year. Is that right?

Mr. John Finnegan

Yes, at the start of next year.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Will Mr. Finnegan respond on RESS, floating offshore wind energy and the planning obstacles?

I have actually thought of a question for the ESB in the area of public lighting. There seems to be an issue where it is contracted out, as it is in many local authorities. The contractor still needs the ESB to open the connection when there is an issue or fault. I do not know why it was ever outsourced, but it seems to be excessively truncated. The system is antiquated. The ESB has to be called a dozen times in a couple of weeks if there is a problem for the contractor to be able to do the work it is contracted to do. It seems messy. I have experienced it in a few places. A lot of phonecalls had to be made for what seemed to be simple stuff, to get a public light turned back on. I do not know. Perhaps that is something the ESB does not want to get into, but if it has a comment on it, I would welcome it.

Mr. John Finnegan

The RESS is an extremely important programme. It is central to meeting our renewable targets and hence our carbon targets. Everyone shares the concern that has been mentioned already about the survey earlier in the week where 98% of the stakeholders expressed exasperation or a concern that we were not going to meet those targets. As the Department stated at the time, we understand their concerns. We work very closely all of the people involved in that survey. We are working very hard to address those concerns and we have been very successful so far with RESS and its predecessors. The core issues that delay all of this are planning and grid connections. There are two aspects to reducing the planning times and they are both well under way. When the new planning legislation comes into force, it will put statutory deadlines in place for all stages of the process for the first time. For the first time, those also will be extended to An Bord Pleanála. Equally importantly, we can send on the figures for this if the committee wishes, there has been a huge increase in manpower resources available to local authorities, the National Parks and Wildlife Service and An Bord Pleanála to process the applications. In fairness to the authorities, the applications are very complex. They have a very heavy burden in assessing the environmental and other impacts of these projects. There is no point in setting the deadlines unless they are also provided with the resources to process the applications appropriately. We have updated figures on that which I will provide to the committee afterwards. To summarise, the statutory changes will impose statutory deadlines and there has been a large investment in resources, in terms of people to process these things.

The issue of the grid is always a concern-----

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

If I could interrupt for a second, you spoke mostly about local authorities. How many of these applications will go straight to An Bord Pleanála? There is a big backlog there. Some of the biggest delays in my experience, not only the area of energy, are with An Bord Pleanála.

Mr. John Finnegan

A certain number of them go directly to An Bord Pleanála. One of the problems in the system is there is a great tendency towards appeals. A lot of things end up in An Bord Pleanála. One of the major innovations in the new legislation is that for the first time, An Bord Pleanála will be subject to deadlines. It will have significant additional resources to allow it to meet that requirement.

The grid is a constant issue. Much progress has been made in improving the grid offer with the current ECP system. Before this was introduced, there was a very large backlog of projects that had not even received a grid offer. With the current system having been in operation for three years, the backlog has been cleared and our colleagues in CRU are working on the successor to it, which will aim to provide even more timely connection offers. We are working with them and with EirGrid to ensure they can deliver the timely offers and build out the connections on a timely basis. We have to acknowledge that is a huge challenge as it is a transformation of the system. We are putting a relatively large number of connections for generators in places where there was no generation before and where many more connections are needed and then the power is being brought far away from that to where the centres of demand are. We have to acknowledge the work that has been done, but it is a constant focus on the Department to make sure that the planning delays are dealt with and that the grid connections are available on a timely basis and that we can continue that progress. We are confident that RESS will continue and that we are on track to meet the targets for onshore wind. In fact, it looks to be increasing because onshore wind is going to play a huge part in meeting our carbon targets by 2030.

Regarding offshore wind, we have had a very successful first ORESS auction this year, which was very encouraging. Despite the fact that it was pioneering, it was highly subscribed and a significant number of projects will be coming on stream, seeking planning in the Irish Sea. The next stage of that will be ORESS 2, which will be even more plan-led. We will be designating areas in the Celtic Sea for that.

On the switch from fixed to floating technology, we are technologically neutral. A few years ago, we would have thought that floating technology would be coming much earlier. However, what is happening now is that the fixed technology is improving. It looks like there will be fixed offshore projects coming on stream further out to sea and for longer than we thought. As the Acting Chair correctly noted, there is a limited number of promoters that can do these projects. They are interested in many markets. We need to keep our focus on designing the new systems, running the auctions and making sure that we also have the planning and grid system in place to keep these projects coming.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

If they wish, the ESB and the CRU representatives may also have a comment to make on that stuff. I appreciate many of the points made about some of the issues being in train but it is a competitive field. There is concern about other countries racing ahead of us. This is particularly frustrating given the natural advantages we have. Will the ESB make a comment on the public lighting issue?

Mr. Nicholas Tarrant

. I will comment briefly on the targets and the work being done on those. I will come back to Senator Burke's questions on district heating and deal with the public lighting question.

On the targets, there have been huge successes to achieve almost 6 GW of renewables connected. We are a world leader when it comes to onshore wind. We have much more to do to get to the 17 GW between onshore wind and solar power by 2030. The pipeline coming next year, has the potential to add more than 1 GW next year. The average we would need to be at to hit the targets for 2030 is in excess of that, but a lot of work is happening regarding investment. We are scaling up the organisation. As I mentioned in my opening statement, we have a recruitment process under way. . We are also looking to build our contractor base to deliver on everything from the low voltage network, which feeds out to homes and businesses, right up to transmission level investment. We are looking to scale up resources to be able to deliver for the country out to 2030.

I will ask Mr Rossiter to make a comment on the public lighting and to mention contacts that have happened around the issue of district heating. I will make one introductory comment on public lighting. Our strategy launched in January made specific reference to the public lighting programme and the conversion to LEDs. This is a huge, multi-year, energy efficiency project that is under way across the local authorities. We are working in co-operation with local authorities on that very extensive and important programme.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

There are approximately 480,000 public lights across the 31 local authorities. The most significant programme under way at the moment to convert those from traditional technology to modern LED technology is the public lighting energy efficiency programme, PLEEP. At present, 21 local authorities are participating in this with three lead local authorities. There are south-west, east and north-west groups. Cork County Council is taking the lead in the south west, Kilkenny County Council in the east and Mayo County Council in the north west. In the south west, there are approximately 92,000 lights, the east group has 114,000 and the north west has 76,000. We are supporting this project by training the local authority contractors to work in proximity to our network. We train, assess and audit them when they need to come into proximity with our network. Approximately 30% of all public lights are on our overhead network. That is where the interface with ESB Networks would come in, regarding the assets transferred in the early to mid-2000s, where we try to unbundle those assets from our network. ESB Networks may be required to take action in the case of contact with the live network or where access to our assets are required in order to unbundle them.

From that point on, there will be no requirement to go back to the ESB assets because they will have been unbundled completely. It is a very ambitious programme. It is one of the main sustainability programmes that local authorities have under way. We are trying very hard to support the local authorities in this. We have monthly meetings set up with each local authority to work through the programmes.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I am not sure for what reason, in the instances I am thinking of, the ESB had to come into it but it certainly seemed to slow things down in terms of the contractor being able to do the job. It may seem a small enough issue in some ways but if there are three or four lights out on a street, it is a hazard for people walking from the shops. I know it is not the responsibility of the witnesses as such but there does seem to be something about the process. Perhaps it is particular to my local authority area. It seems to be a bit slow to get onto contractors on behalf of the council and the contractors then say they are waiting for the ESB to open up the connection.

Mr. Alan Rossiter

The only requirement in that instance would be if there were some issue with the ESB infrastructure. Predominantly it is not for ESB Networks in these instances for a small number of lights.

To respond to Senator Burke on district heating, we have had three initial consultations on large-scale district heating, one in Dublin, one in Waterford and one in Galway. They have outlined their plans for this district heating. We have had this initial consultation with them. We are waiting to see where it may lead in these three areas.

Senator Paddy Burke

Is it that somebody has to say they will fund it?

Mr. Alan Rossiter

I am not aware of the particulars in these three areas but they have made contact on plans to have large-scale district heating in the three locations.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

As it happens, I have just received an email on the issue I raised to state that as the ESB infrastructure in Togher and other areas is old, the ESB will upgrade the overhead lines and transformers which will affect the public lighting. We only find out about ESB work when the public lighting goes out. We might pick up on this issue at another stage.

Before we finish up, do the witnesses have anything further to add?

Mr. Jim Gannon

It is worth referring to the district heating Bill in development in the Houses at present. I cannot remember when it is due for publication but it is worth the committee keeping an eye on it.

I support Mr. Finnegan's comments on the delivery of renewables. It is a very ambitious programme. It is something we all support and deliver together, between the Department setting policy and the regulator working with ESB Networks and EirGrid in particular to deliver the infrastructure required and making sure the money is available and the connection processes are there to get connections offers out. It is worth saying that when rural electrification happened it was welcomed by almost all as a transformative project for the country. People welcomed the infrastructure relating to it. The decarbonisation of this network, and of our society and economy, is at least as important and we all need to be supportive of the infrastructure that will also be needed to transform the economy. It is difficult and it can be an imposition but it is too important a point to miss. We all need to be involved in this dialogue.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

I agree. There were challenges with rural electrification. They were very clever and sent all sorts of people around the country with the message that it was safe. It would be fair to say that if we had to do it nowadays, it would never happen. This is a big challenge in our society. We will have to put up with the infrastructure onshore. I live in an area where there was a very poor supply of electricity initially. There is now a mill processing 600,000 tons of timber and we can imagine its energy usage. Power lines have been brought into the area from all directions. Fair play to the community; people have accepted the trucks and power lines in return for economic prosperity. We as a nation have to start making sure the right choices are made and get on with it.

Dividing between onshore wind and offshore fixed wind is a crucial parameter, as is offshore floating wind. What are the revised targets between the three for the next five years or up to 2030? Everything will stop in 2030. Either we will have achieved the targets by 2030 or we will all stop.

Mr. John Finnegan

The targets for offshore do not distinguish between fixed and floating. It will depend on advances in technology at the time. The target for onshore wind is 9 GW by 2030, with 5 GW of offshore wind connected to the grid and a further 2 GW not connected to the grid but presumably dedicated to hydrogen production.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

On the 9 GW-----

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I must cut off the discussion now.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

This is probably one of the best sessions we have ever had in this committee-----

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

I am very glad for you.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

-----and we have had some good ones. I take it all of the offshore development that will happen between now and 2030 will be fixed to the bottom of the sea.

Mr. John Finnegan

That would be a reasonable assumption.

Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív

That will expand after 2030 and go to the very new technologies.

Mr. John Finnegan

Yes.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire)

Go raibh míle maith agaibh go léir. That concludes the business of the committee in public session. I propose that the committee go into private session to consider other business.

The joint committee went into private session at 12.38 p.m. and adjourned at 12.41 p.m. sine die.