Ireland’s Renewables Update
In December, Ireland’s DSO energised our largest solar farm to date at Gillinstown, County Meath. The project is one of two significant solar park developments in Ireland by Highfield Solar Limited.
It’s a major milestone for Ireland’s climate response, the large utility-scale deployment of solar energy, which has greater dependability and predictability than other renewables.
Total Renewables Deployment
The total deployment of renewable energy in Ireland now stands at 5,400 MW. This is principally wind energy which we have been doing successfully in Ireland for more than thirty years.
ESB strategy is for Ireland to deploy an equivalent amount of solar energy within five years, and to have capacity for 8,000 MW of solar within seven years.
Last year Ireland had a “record” year deploying 688 MW of renewables, mainly wind energy, which comprised 23 projects.
Now we need another seven “record” years on top.
Going forward, we should match this number in solar energy alone in 2023, and exceed it again with wind energy and solar energy in every subsequent year out to 2030 to meet our Climate Action Plan and the Net Zero targets.
Grid-scale Battery Storage
Our total grid-scale “energy storage” to date is almost 800 MW.
It’s not clear whether the ESB includes Turlough Hill’s 292 MW of storage in the overall figure, as pumped-hydro is “storage” and is regarded as the cheapest form of grid-scale storage in other countries.
If Solar PV is the cheapest way to produce electricity, and pumped hydro is the cheapest way to store electricity, it would not surprise anyone that network operators would give due consideration to these technologies in planning our future.
New Grid Connections
Additionally there were 34,000 new domestic electricity connections in 2022 which seems a significant increase over previous years.
According to the ESB these new homes are increasingly “all-electric” homes, helping to accomplish our CAP targets.
It would be good to know how many of these 34,000 new connections also had micro-generation like solar PV installed.
Contact Us today if you are ready to use a solar PV system in your new all-electric home.
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