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All has been quiet here for the last few days; the Christmas period taking its toll on our contributors. But the countdown to the election continues nonetheless and issues remain. It seems again the government’s shortsightedness over electricity generation in this country is going to come back and bite us in the ass: IDA warns of power crisis if swift action not taken. Now, obviously the government is going to commission a report about the crisis costing millions, coming back late and in two years time, with the same advice that everyone tells them. But if any minister is reading, here is an idea or two off the top of my head.
- Impose a tax on non energy saving light bulbs and cut VAT on energy savers. 3% of our energy use in this country is from domestic lighting. Using energy efficient bulbs would knock 2% off that, or about a year’s growth in demand.
- Separate EirGrid from the ESB completely and increase the openness of the grid to smaller producers and allow domestic householders who have energy generation, solar panels, etc., to feed power back into the grid.
- Begin the construction of a gas-powered power station in Mayo so that it will be operational when the Corrib field is tapped rather than five years afterwards. (I know, you can just pipe it to existing power stations, but we do not have enough at the moment so we might as well build one there.)
- Copy the North: make solar panels a stipulation of all planning permission.
- When Airtricity pulled out of the residential market it said it was “failed by the electricity market rules which have not provided a framework for any form of effective competition.” Sort that, we already have the telecoms poodle; we don’t need a electricity labradoodle.
I have already talked about electricity here. If any one has a few other suggestions, please add them—maybe the government will save us another of their reports which they do nothing about.
Good post. I’m guessing what you mean by…
…is that the ESB should transfer ownership (rather than just management as is presently the case) of the grid over to Eirgrid. If so, I’m right behind you on that one. The single greatest error committed when Eircom was privatised was that control and ownership over the network itself wasn’t spun off into a separate Eirgrid-like company.
I firmly believe in this case the ordinary voter is more to blame than the government. How many of us leave the TV, Video, Computer, Stereo etc on standby all night every night? How many of us have switched over to energy saving lightbulbs. In fact how many of us leave lights on when the room is not being used? How many readers have made their houses look like tacky cast offs from trailer park America. The power of one may not solve the world’s energy crisis but before we stick the knife in the government over this issue lets make sure we’re doing our part. I have a list of things to ream the government candidates with when they call to the door but electricity generation isn’t going to be one of them.
CF, that’s a fair point, but it’s not quite what Simon’s talking about. What your talking about is more to do with current energy usage whereas what Simon’s talking about is where we’re going to get the energy in the future.
Hi Keith, I think if people take responsibility for saving energy at the moment then that will get us through the short term. I’ve been doing some investigation into alternative energy options. I’m putting in a wood chip & pellet burner in the next month or so. I think that technology has just reached the point where it is a viable option. However I have also looked at small wind turbines and solar panels. They are not viable….yet. I think in 3 years time they will have evolved enough that I will look to put them in.
In recent years we have seen a communications revolution. 10 years ago you would have been hard pressed to predict the take up in mobile phones and broadband and the communications revolution that has followed. I think in 10 years solar panels and/or wind turbines will be as common on roofs as Sky dishes. It will never replace the need for power stations but the evolving “power of one” could yet be the phenomena of the teens (2010 onwards).