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LABOUR HAVE CALLED on the government to ensure the State plays a greater role in the development of offshore wind farms.
It follows a new investigation published today by The Journal Investigates that found just two Irish companies hold a significant stake in the numerous offshore wind projects currently in the pipeline off the Irish coast.
ESB and Kerry-based wind energy developer Saorgus Energy are involved in two separate projects, but neither is the lead developer.
This means one of Ireland’s most lucrative natural resources is being sold to a range of foreign investors looking to make a profit.
Labour Spokesperson for Climate and Energy Ciarán Ahern said: “It’s deeply worrying that one of Ireland’s most abundant natural resources, our wind energy capacity, appears to be being handed over to private interests.”
He said that while he acknowledged the need for private investment and expertise, “for the ESB to hold a stake in only one offshore wind farm – and not even a controlling stake at that – is cause for concern”. ESB declined to comment.
Ahern said that offshore wind farms will be a “vital piece of infrastructure” in the near future and that the State should take “a much stronger role” in their development.
ESB will be involved in future offshore wind projects, having signed an agreement with Danish energy company, Ørsted, in 2023 to develop an offshore wind portfolio. However, these projects are not at an advanced stage.
Today’s investigation also revealed that half of the six projects that are furthest along in development are backed by fossil fuel companies, including big oil and gas.
Among the companies involved are oil company BP, who are in partnership with Japan’s largest power generation company JERA on one project, French state-owned energy company EDF and a German multinational energy company RWE — one of Europe’s largest CO2 emitters over the last five years.
Ahern added that he was “particularly troubled” by the involvement of these fossil fuel companies in the projects.
“We cannot allow the rollout of these vital pieces of infrastructure [to] become exercises in greenwashing for those doing the most damage to the global environment and climate.”
“The benefits of Ireland’s natural resources should be enjoyed by everyone; they cannot simply be another revenue stream for foreign-owned big energy companies,” he continued.
The companies behind the projects said they were committed to investing in renewable energy and helping Ireland reach its climate targets.
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Conor O’Carroll is an investigative reporter with The Journal Investigates.
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We are the laughing stock of Europe. It’s a no brainier. We could sell the power to Europe but the incompetence of the Irish government is laughable. It’s 2025 and we have one off shore wind farm.
@Nurse On Call.: It’s disgraceful. If only we had a huge windfall that we could use.
@Nurse On Call.: absolute brilliant comment we are the laughing stock of Europe
@Nurse On Call.: we don’t have enough for ourselves why would we do that, wind power generation is a supplement to gas and always will.
@Nurse On Call.: The same thing will be and is happening all over Europe and for that matter around the world. I don’t know why some people say things like ‘we are the laughing stock of the world’. Nobody else is even paying any attention or cares. I do think the Irish government should be more involved and could use some of the cash reserves that we currently have to do so as the demand for energy will be endless and it would be a big revenue generator for the state. But these projects cost a lot of money to develop and require the know how of those who specialise in them.
We had the so called Green Party in government and we didn’t move an inch on this. Plenty of empty cycle lanes and extra taxes though.
Keep it away from the government/taxpayer. If they are involved in it, it will never be built and if they are built, they would be run by incompetent civil servants who can’t be sacked.
Calls for the Government of Ireland to have a greater role in renewable energy? Are you having a laugh? They’ll rob us the taxpayers to build them and then the will sell it off to the poorest bidder to rob us the taxpayers when it comes to buying the electricity back from these turbines.
Look at Derrybrien in South County Galway , shut down with the last 2-1/2 years. A friend of mine who works with the ESB wanted to turn one back on and all he looked at was a seized wind turbine
That should’ve been an old brighter from the very very start and we need to harness our natural resource resources not sell them to line their own pockets while the taxpayer is getting shafted with high energy bills
And I wouldn’t mind we are getting charged on our bills for the creation of these wind farms and renewable resources so why can’t we benefit from it also?
@Bren: one excuse used for many projects sold on include no expertise in the area. These plicks should hire experts in as heaven knows our ministers have enough advisers on their speed dials for everything else
I guess most people would be in favour of the Irish government owning the wind farms and selling the electricity. And, would agree that the government and most irish companies don’t have the expertise to build them. So then the question is: if the irish government put out a contract for the construction of an offshore wind farm that they would own and get the profits from, would any company build it under those circumstances? Or do they only want to build what they would own afterwards?
@Brian Lynch: they would probably give the contract to BAM Brian
@Brian Lynch: yes you could get a company to build them and then hand it over to public ownership, pretty much like every other capital project in the state. The problem is that our politicians and public sector will either decide to change things after the contract is signed leaving us open to ridiculous extra claims by the contractor (see children’s hospital) or wouldn’t even know what the ballpark construction costs would be to see if we were getting value for money.
@Brian Lynch: Did Irish people not construct the existing ones?
@Nicholas Grubb: Carbon capture is a scam. Looks good, does little. It costs as much to retrieve it from the atmosphere as the process of putting it there in the first place. So no resolution to the problem. Worst of all it keeps people believing that there is a techo solution out there that can resolve our problem with excess carbon pollution – and the consequential destruction of our environment and climate stability without major changes to the way we live now. This means about a century of ever increasing climate and environmental crisis before humans become extinct.
Any chance of a few mobile units to follow the windy Jennifer Carroll McNeill around. They’d be paid off in no time.
Amazing lack of tech understanding in comments above. Every Kw of wind power has to have the same amount of quick response gas fired power sitting there as backup. The fossil fuel gang don’t hate it, they love it and indeed are heavily invested in it. The real big plan behind it all is to go for Carbon capture for which they aim to charge us a fortune. No.Only one way out of all this and that is a quick re directing of the world military industrial complex to the building and installation of literally thousands of SMRs, or so says Prof.James E Hansen, the great guru of Global Warming. This is what Neutral Ireland should be pushing.
Keep voting for politicians who sell our national resources to the highest bidders and put us as consumers under the yoke of privatisation in perpetuity. If you didn’t vote in the GE you cannot complain and if you did ask yourself did your vote end up in the pocket of big oil or gas?
Why only the Government? The whole Dáil should get involved. There’s enough wind in there to power Europe!
Ffg dna to give every bit of valuable infrastructure that irish citizens needs to there the world disgusting wealthy overlords is increasing faster and faster
How much of the
@Michael McSharry: how much of the $10 billion spent by fossil fuel companies and their lobbyists to bribe politicians all over the world in 2024 to stop or delay renewable energy projects like offshore wind farms ended up in the pockets or rather the offshore bank accounts of Irish politicians. We have had at least three years delay in mapping and granting licenses to develop our offshore wind resource. We have not even identified a port in state suitable to assemble offshore wind turbines. We do not even have a plan to upgrade the grid network to carry renewable energy to our urban markets. Can anyone even argue this is all the result of ignorance and accidental delay and not massive corruption by our political corpus.
Disgraceful but not untypical for behaviour by the HSE in Beaumont Hospital.
Not fit for purpose should be disbanded and a new , authority directly answerable to Department of Health .
All Hospitals
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