Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 28 September 2023
72. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications to outline the work under way by his Department to support community-led renewable energy generation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41917/23]
View answerTo follow up on the Minister of State’s comments about community energy and how the Government will put an emphasis on that, my question relates specifically to that matter. Will the Minister of State outline the work that is under way by his Department to support community-led renewable energy generation?
Through the first two RESS auctions, my Department provided pathways and supports for communities to participate in renewable energy projects via the application of a community projects category and the requirement of a mandatory community benefit fund for all RESS projects. Furthermore, a community enabling framework for renewable energy projects to provide a package of enabling supports, including technical, financial and legal services, has been rolled out to assist communities in navigating the challenging terrain of electricity generation. The SEAI is leading in implementing and facilitating these components of the framework, which include a trusted advisory service, enabling grants and nine information guides on the SEAI's website. To address some of the challenges associated with grid connections, the SEAI is also undertaking grid studies on a county basis to support communities in identifying sites within their localities that are most likely to have an economically viable grid connection. Three such studies have taken place so far, with accompanying community information events highlighting the results. Four more studies are planned in the coming months.
Through my Department’s continued engagement with renewable energy communities, RECs, there is evidence of significant challenges that REC projects may face with the competitive, auction-based nature of RESS along with grid and other barriers to project delivery. Therefore, a community projects preference category has not been included in RESS 3. Rather, support for communities for the development of renewable projects will now transition to the non-competitive small-scale renewable electricity support scheme, SRESS. The export tariff phase of SRESS to support small-scale and community renewable projects is due to be launched later this year. This scheme will align more closely with the experience and capacity of the community energy sector and support a more sustainable delivery pathway to the renewable energy community target of 500 MW by 2030.
We declared a climate emergency and a biodiversity emergency in 2019. While I welcome the Minister of State’s positive comments, I have no idea as to how the Government is making decisions. In RESS 1, seven community projects were successful but only four remain. I have no details in that regard. I understand that three pulled out and four are in progress. In RESS 2, eight community projects were successful, but we do not know how many are still functioning, if they will be extended or what review the Department has carried out in respect of them. The Government has now changed tack and is going with RESS 3 while a support package will be announced later this year. I do not know whether that is good or bad, but I will say where I am coming from - I believe that an integral part of the solution is community-led projects with people on board. The duty of the Minister of State and his Department is to outline to us in clear, readable English what progress has been achieved, what the Government has learned, what has failed and why the Government has changed tack. It would be helpful if they could do that.
Perhaps a new approach would be to get copies of the responses to questions. It would be helpful for Deputies to have those while the Minister of State reads them out.
The Department's assessment is that auctions are not the best option for renewable energy project support. For this reason, the Department is moving towards supporting community energy projects through a non-competitive renewable energy support scheme. This will take community projects out of the auction practice.
If the Deputy wants more details about the results of the auctions beyond what has been published, she can contact my office. I will be happy to try to assist in that way.
My Department has analysed the challenges for community energy projects.
They are not all about price or finance; a lot of it is to do with information because it is a complex process. The SEAI has been tasked with providing as much information as possible to enable community energy projects to go ahead and provide things like technical, financial and legal services through the community enabling framework. The Department is trying to find every way it can to enable community energy projects to happen and take them out of the auctions process.
I welcome that it has gone into the non-competitive section and that the Department is working on this. My difficulty is that I have no analysis before me as to what happened in RESS 1 and 2, where community groups were involved. Is there documentation, data or an analysis of what did and did not work which led the Department to what theoretically would be a very welcome change in terms of moving into the non-competitive area?
My trust is at an all-time low. We are facing a precipice in regard to climate action and we need urgent action. I will digress a tiny bit, but my comments are related to my question. I am often very critical of it, but Galway City Council did its job in 2021 regarding a decarbonisation zone. It set out the zone, but two and a half years later nothing has happened. I live in the Claddagh and know Galway very well. I was born and bred there. I see huge opportunities for community led projects to make communities independent, but we need an analysis from the Department in terms of how decisions are being made.
There are comprehensive and deep resources available on the SEAI website at the moment. There are now nine different information guides covering different sectors of what is required in order to set up a community energy scheme.
I want an analysis of what happened, not what the SEAI is now doing.
The Deputy can table that as another question and I will be very happy to answer that.
Dear God.
It justifies a deeper answer than what I can give. There is clearly a commitment in the Department to help and foster community energy and switch from the competitive auction process towards a non-competitive, supported community energy support scheme. I invite the Deputy to promote any energy scheme in her area and to contact the Department for details.
