Green Machine

ENERGY:IF THE green energy revolution is to become reality, Padraig McManus, ESB's chief executive, needs to share the dream. For all the new players on the market, the State's main energy supplier will dictate how the masses feed their energy needs.

What about our increasing domestic and industrial demands? If we add transport to our electric needs through plug-in vehicles, can we keep the green dream alive?

McManus reckons it’s realistic – not only the ESB’s own targets of sourcing 30 per cent of its portfolio from renewable sources by 2020, but also plans to roll out supporting infrastructure over the next three years.

While he won’t commit to the targets for up to 350,000 electric vehicles on our roads within 11 years, as espoused by politicians, he says: “If you get a certain momentum, you’ll be amazed how far you can go. I believe that over a three- to five-year period, if you could show that the infrastructure is rolling out and the cars are on the road, it will work.” He admits there is still a mindset challenge. “We should really focus on proving to people that it’s a viable alternative and I think we can do that in three years. After that, anything’s possible.”

He accepts there are significant hurdles – not least creating public access plug-in points. Then there is the grid, which will struggle if everyone plugs in their cars and turns on appliances when they return from work. Nevertheless, he argues, these can all be resolved.

The bigger issue for McManus and the ESB is cleaning up the source of their supply. For that, he sees fossil fuels as a critical part of the mix, along with renewables and an increased interconnection system with Britain.

“The key issue for Ireland is to have solid interconnection to the UK because, with the variability of wind, you need a much bigger market. . . [With] better interconnection to the UK, you can sell wind energy when you have it to a much bigger market and therefore develop it to a much greater degree.”

Which renewable does he sees as most viable? “Wave and tidal are developing, biomass is something people are looking at. However, the one that works at the moment is wind. It’s robust, the technology is developed, the manufacturing capability is now there so in the short term that’s the renewable of choice.”

However, McManus is under no doubt that fossil fuels will play a part. “The world can’t replace fossil fuels. They are very much going to be a part of power generation. The fuels that Ireland is going to have in the future will be gas, coal, renewables and interconnections. That’s how Ireland is going to be fuelled. The future for coal is we will have carbon capture, where you will burn a fossil fuel but you will be capturing CO2. We are not going to do away with gas or coal for the foreseeable future.”

Suggestions that, by closing the coal-burning plant in Moneypoint, we will meet our emissions commitments are too simplistic, he says. “If we get out of coal, Ireland is totally dependent on gas [for now]. We need a few different sources and coal is always going to be one of them. It would not be a robust strategy for the future [to cut out coal from the equation].”

As to any potential nuclear option, he accepts that interconnection offers access to UK nuclear energy and thereby “an Irish solution to an Irish problem”. However, he does see some sense in the position.

“The value you get from nuclear is that you build a lot of stations and get economies of scale – common training and common parts.”

So what would we be doing, building one nuclear station and having to build the entire infrastructure around supporting one station? “We always need a mix of fuels to have a certain amount of independence. If gas runs out as quickly as some say it will, Ireland will need an alternative because we will be totally dependent on imported coal, our own renewables and interconnection. That’s when Ireland will have to consider if we need nuclear. And that decision is probably 15 to 20 years away.”

Clearly, whatever about increasing our wind or even wave power supply, the energy debate will continue for some time to come.