Moneypoint’s green future, Dublin’s house prices, and Biden’s tax plan

The ESB will today announce that Moneypoint power station is to become a major base for renewable energy tied into the building of a major offshore wind farm off the coast of Clare in partnership with Norwegian energy company Equinor. Kevin O'Sullivan reports it will also be the location for the ESB's first move into green hydrogen production with a view to exporting the fuel from its deep sea berth at the facility in the Shannon Estuary.

House prices rose in Dublin by 1 per cent in the first quarter of the year compared with the previous three-month period but declined marginally in the rest of the country, according to a new report from MyHome.ie. Nationally, there was no change in prices quarter on quarter, with a 0.4 per cent decline recorded outside Dublin. Ciara O'Brien reports.

Irish commuters returned to the nations' transport network in their droves in March, reports Mark Paul. That is according to detailed consumer spending data from the digital payments platform Revolut.

The EU will vaccinate most of its population by the summer, Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe said yesterday. The Minister acknowledged that the EU had difficulties with the programme at the outset, as it had no experience of centralising a vaccination scheme on this scale. Barry O'Halloran has the details.

Graduates now earn more in Ireland than in UK, but Germany tops both

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Crunch point awaits Ireland in global corporate tax debate

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How to avoid turning staff into lab rats in a hybrid work experiment

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Jobs market remains surprisingly resilient despite year of Covid crisis

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Barry also reports on Cargo airline ASL Aviation Holdings which will borrow up to €105 million from US bank Goldman Sachs to help pay for 20 Boeing jets the carrier is buying. Dublin-based ASL recently confirmed it would add a total of 20 new Boeing 737 800 planes, converted to carry freight, to its fleet as part of an overall replacement programme.

Outsourcing firm Abtran, which operates the helpline for the State's Local Property Tax (LPT), last year received fees from the Revenue Commissioners of €1.5 million. Gordon Deegan reports that new figures provided by Revenue show that since March 2013, the Cork-headquartered firm has received fees totalling €19.7 million for the operation of the LPT.

In this week's Agenda, Cliff Taylor writes how US president Joe Biden's corporate tax proposal threatens to tear up one of Ireland's key calling cards for attracting foreign investment.

In Caveat, Mark Paul argues that mandatory hotel quarantine is controversial for a good reason and that depriving people of their liberty is not guaranteed to have any huge effect on the virus .

Retail and hospitality aside, the jobs market has remained surprisingly resilient over the last year and recruitment and salaries in finance, insurance and banking have held up. Olive Keogh speaks to recruiters about the durability of some sectors of the jobs markets in this week's World of Work.

Some companies have laid the groundwork for some serious experimentation after blanket-bombing remote-working staff with questionnaires and engagement surveys asking how they feel about returning to the workplace. Andrew Hill says carrying out a small series of trials and assessing their impact on workers is the best way forward when planning for the workplace post-Covid.

In his column this week, John FitzGerald looks back at the history of economic migration between Ireland and Britain, and while moving across the pond was at one time a way to be much more financially secure, graduates now earn more in Ireland than in the UK, but one European country, however, tops both.

From the flatlands of Longford to the highest mountain on earth, a London-based engineer wrestled his fears to climb Mount Everest, but then the Earth moved. Paul Devaney features in this week's Wild Geese.

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