The threat of a potential electricity blackout this winter has receded to its lowest level in years with new generating capacity coming on stream.

In its winter outlook, Eirgrid, which runs the national electricity grid, said Ireland should have sufficient electricity generation capacity this winter to ensure security of supply is maintained.

Although energy demand growth is set to continue, with an expected peak of 5,250 megawatts (mw) during the winter period, this will be more than met by new plants, in particular the 401mw Huntsdown Two power station, Eirgrid said.

The installed capacity of wind generation will also have increased to 900-1,000mw, up 25 per cent on the same period last year. The two peat-burning stations at Lough Ree, Co Longford, and west Offaly, which are undergoing repair, are also expected to be back in operation.

At 200mw, the capacity to import power from Northern Ireland is not expected to change from last year.

Overall, for the winter period, there will be 5,930mw of dispatchable plant installed, Eirgrid said. However, this excludes the 242mw unit three at Poolbeg and the 73mw unit at Turlough Hill.

Last year, demand peaked at an all-time high of 5,035mw, and this winter Eirgrid said demand could be up to 4.5 per cent higher. It said the report made reasonable assumptions and estimates of performance this winter, based on its own analysis and on discussions with each of the power generation companies.

However, director of operations at Eirgrid, Fintan Slye, called on generators to improve availability over the coming year.

Eirgrid's assumptions are based on predicted forced outage rates of 11.5 per cent, which are based on the average performance of plants over the past three years. This compares with typical best international practice of 6 to 8 per cent. "At the launch of our annual report, we highlighted the need to improve performance," he said.

There are no scheduled outages from November 4th, 2007, to March 3rd, 2008, Eirgrid said.

However, the report warned that capacity problems could arise if power generation companies did not meet their obligations. This could be exacerbated if imports from the North were limited or wind generation was low. While almost 1,000mw of wind generation will be installed, the capacity credit of wind is assumed to be 200mw.