The Larry Goodman family-backed company that rescued part of exploration group Providence Resources hopes to restart work on the Barryroe oil and gas field off the south coast.
The news comes as the standoff between the United States and Iran looks set to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed for several weeks more after the conflict involving the pair and Israel shut the vital shipping lane two months ago.
Barryroe Transition Energy is seeking talks with the Government on the possibility of carrying out further appraisal work on Barryroe, where licences held by Providence were extinguished in 2023 after former minister for energy Eamon Ryan refused to renew them for lack of capital.
Industry figures say the new company, backed by the Goodman family, intends applying to the Maritime Area Regulatory Authority (Mara) for a consent to drill an appraisal well in Barryroe, which could potentially hold commercial quantities of oil and gas.
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While Providence once estimated that the field could yield 350 million barrels of oil, a review of that data indicates a potential mix of both oil and gas. An appraisal well would show if it is primarily one or the other, allowing the new company to decide on a way forward for exploiting it.
Legislation bans the Government from issuing new fossil-fuel licences, but lawyers suggest an application to Mara for a maritime area consent allows a possible way through this.
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Policy on security of energy supplies could allow for such applications through the maritime regulatory system, they say.
Barryroe has €100 million available to it through the Goodman family, which owns the business outright, allowing it to meet capital requirements.
[ Larry Goodman continues to eye developing Irish oil field after licence expiryOpens in new window ]
Alan Curran, chief executive of Barryroe Transition Energy, confirmed the company was seeking to meet Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment Darragh O’Brien to discuss its plans.
He stressed that the business was seeking “constructive talks” and was “respectful of Government policy” to cut the Republic’s dependence on fossil fuels and to reach net zero carbon by 2050.
The company’s argument is that the State will continue to need fossil fuels for a period as it moves towards this while having a domestic resource would bolster security of energy supplies generally, and cut emissions associated with importing them.
Ireland as a whole relies on natural gas to generate half the electricity consumed here and imports about 80 per cent of what it needed via the UK, some of which comes from Europe and further afield.
Last year, global body the Energy Institute published research showing fossil fuels accounted for 81.4 per cent of all Irish energy consumption in 2024, a slight increase on 2023.
Allowing work to restart on Barryroe would require the Government to change policy on exploring and exploiting oil and gas in Irish waters.
The Goodman family was the main shareholder in Providence in 2023. The High Court approved a rescue of the exploration business once backed by the late Tony O’Reilly and his family following an examinership that ended in November of that year.
While the Barryroe exploration licences no longer exist, the company has access to years of technical data collected on the field and its potential.
The reservoir, close to the Co Cork coast, could be extensive and poses different challenges should it be exploited.
