Ireland has set itself a tough target of 40% of electricity generation from renewable energy by 2020. EirGrid’s Grid 25 document, published last year provides a detailed strategy for developing the grid to facilitate the 40% target. Eirgrid says it is “currently on target to meet the challenging 40% target for 2020”

“During 2008, the level of 1,000 MW of wind energy was exceeded and this will increase significantly under the current connection processes.”

Despite the positive noises – 3000 megawatts (MW) of consented and proposed offshore wind energy projects cannot be built because there are no power lines with capacity to accommodate the green electricity. Over 1600 MW of projects already have consent including Fred Olsen/ Treasury Holdings 1100 MW Colding wind farm and Airtricity’s 520 MW east coast Arklow project. The projects are also relying on a government introduced ‘feed in tariff’ which guarantees a fixed price for the electricity to make offshore wind energy attractive to investors.

The domestic grid infrastructure required for Irish offshore wind energy projects is being progressed separately from the new strategic grid cable linking Ireland with Wales and the rest of the UK. The east – west, Ireland- Wales cable is reportedly also struggling with Norwegian offshore company Imera unable to source finance for the project. In April, Imera parent company – Oceanteam announced it was abandoning all project work in the offshore renewables industry after write-downs on offshore wind energy projects including Rhyl Flats, Gunfleet Sands and Alpha Ventus.

In the UK, renewable energy generators pay to connect and use the grid network as part of an “invest and use” strategy currently operated by National Grid and more local distribution network operators (DNO’s). This incremental strategy will not however be sufficient in the long term and there has been much debate recently as to how we can maximise the use of capacity left in the existing grid network through using technologies such as smart grid, whilst at the same time kicking off the development of new grid infrastructure.

The existing system means that investment in the grid network only happens after so many applications by renewable energy developers for access rights have been made. This has the effect of slowing down the delivery of renewable energy projects. National Grid has suggested various alternatives, including the ‘auctioning’ of grid capacity to renewable generating ‘bidders’. A response to this approach has been subject to much in-fighting within the renewable energy industry – but it is difficult to see how this system would efficiently pay for improvements and would inevitably leave some companies with access rights but (because of planning delays) no renewable energy project to connect into the grid – leaving ‘wasted’ capacity.

There is currently no effective mechanism for building new grid infrastructure and we are stuck in a ‘chicken and egg’ situation i.e. developers need to know they can access grid capacity before spending on renewable energy projects but National Grid need projects to justify building additional grid infrastructure. The Renewable Energy Zone approach put forward in the US recently allowing a right for central government to ’step in’ and enforce grid facilitation by individual states, has not been put forward in the UK, however we are dealing with geographically less challenged country. Notwithstanding this, centralised funding for new grid planning would be a timely step in the right direction.

A sustainable and decentralised energy generation network is key if we are to improve our energy self sufficiency and reduce carbon emissions. The more energy generated close to home, the better. However it is recognised that although this reduces transmission losses, it does leave grid network operators with more and more complex systems to manage. As with everything else in the world – it is all about getting the right balance.

A combination of different, geographically appropriate renewable energy technologies in each country is healthy. In the UK different types of wind energy projects are being built from large offshore wind ‘power stations’ in the sea to small wind farms close to large centres of population. Research and development for wave and tidal is expanding. We are going to have to accept the effects of renewable energy projects on our daily lives – for example the visual impacts of onshore wind farms or some limited ecological effects of tidal projects, if we want locally produced energy that can be connected to the electricity grid network within a reasonable timeframe. We need to accept that there are impacts of going green including effects from new grid transmission lines – as compared with the effects of climate change these pale into insignificance.