Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 10 November 2020
219. Deputy Duncan Smith asked the Minister for Environment, Climate and Communications if his Department is on track to facilitate allowing persons sell excess power back to the grid by June 2021; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35158/20]
View answerThe Programme for Government commits to prioritising the development of micro-generation, letting people sell excess power back to the grid by July 2021. The measures set out below will assist in delivering this commitment. The Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) published a Roadmap for the Clean Energy Package’s Electricity and Renewables Directives in March this year, which provides for a public consultation on the regulatory framework for prosumer development later this year. The document is available on the CRU website www.cru.ie.
My Department has provided €10.1m supporting the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) grant scheme to help domestic customers generate electricity through installing rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) equipment on their homes, with 4,104 applications processed to date, saving approx. 3.34kiloTonnes CO2 per annum. We have engaged with SEAI on a review of the scheme to gather data on installation costs, the impact of grant amount and other scheme changes on industry, demand and customer behaviour in order to capture the lessons learned for the Micro-generation Framework.
Action 30 of the Climate Action Plan commits to the delivery of a framework for micro-generation from renewable technologies, whilst ensuring principles of equity, self-consumption and energy efficiency first are incorporated.
A Micro-Generation working group, chaired by my Department, is examining an enabling framework for micro- generation which tackles existing barriers and establishes suitable supports within relevant market segments. The proposed support mechanism will be outlined in a public consultation in the coming months.
A suitable payment for excess electricity generated on site and exported to the grid will be available to all microgenerators by 2021 in line with the transposition of the recast Renewable Energy Directive (2018/2001) into Irish law.
