The purchase of electricity from up to 50 new privately-owned generating stations is set to provide a significant boost to the amount of power being produced from renewable sources, the ESB said yesterday.

Over the next seven years the company is to increase the amount of power being supplied by "greener" generation to almost 600 megawatts of power - the amount of power needed to supply 500,000 domestic users. ESB will be buying power from privately-owned wind farms, landfill gas generation stations, combined heat and power generation, and hydro-electric plants, many of which are due to come on line over the next 18 months.