Holly Cairns
Question:115. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications his views on introducing a net metering or reverse metering system for farms who produce their own energy. [40777/22]
View answerTuesday, 26 July 2022
Questions (115)
Written answers
On the 15 February this year I signed the Regulations (SI 76 of 2022) that transpose Articles 21 and 22 of the recast Renewable Energy Directive. These Regulations allow the Clean Export Guarantee (CEG) tariff to become available for new and existing micro-and small-scale generators so that they will receive payment from their electricity supplier for all excess renewable electricity they export to the grid, reflective of the market value.
These Regulations also transposed Articles 15 and 16 of the Internal Market for Electricity Directive (IMED) 2019. IMED supports a regime for self-consumers that is based in the use of smart meters to provide transparent system to record separately electricity consumed from the grid and electricity that is fed into the grid. To ensure transparent and cost reflective network charges IMED prohibits new net metering or reverse metering schemes after 4 July 2019.
It is important to note that businesses, including farms, will benefit most when they consume electricity on site from their own micro-generation. The financial business case for micro-generation for these electricity users is strong, with shorter payback periods available by matching generation with on-site demand; supplemented with export payments for excess renewable electricity.