Over the past two months, we have successfully retrofitted our house and placed our trust in a heat pump to keep us comfortable in winter.
We have also added solar panels to our roof to generate some of our own electricity. In abandoning gas, we are actually not making ourselves any more dependent on a reliable electricity supply, as the gas boiler also required electricity to function.
However, for the economy as a whole, as part of the journey to decarbonise our way of life, we are moving to electrify transport as well as heat. This will make Ireland all the more dependent on a reliable electricity supply.
The challenge for the future is to deliver a carbon-neutral electricity system with a very high degree of reliability.
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In teaching energy economics I show a segment from the film Die Hard 4, where terrorists take over the control room for the north-east US electricity system and shut down supply. This illustrates in a graphic way how reliable electricity is as a cornerstone of modern society, and the chaos that ensues when it breaks down.
Here at home, we saw how Storm Éowyn’s impact on electricity transmission caused widespread hardship.
In the 2000s, major disruptions in electricity supply in California and Italy left huge numbers without electricity for two days. The ensuing chaos was on a Die Hard 4 scale.
Earlier this year, Spain lost power for two days. It might not have happened if it had been fully integrated into a wider EU system.
Reliability is not something we can take for granted – it needs to be planned for.
Up to 20 years ago, Ireland’s electricity system had no connections to the rest of the world, and there was always the risk that something could go wrong.
While wind and solar are providing an increasing share of our electricity, in a generally calm month like this July, wind only accounted for a quarter of our electricity needs. To keep the system running when renewables were not available we had to rely on gas-fired generation and, to a more limited extent, imports of electricity from Britain.
With higher solar and wind penetration, there may be some reduction in reliance on gas, but it will still be essential as a back-up to keep the lights on, our house heated and electric cars mobile. However, we need to wean ourselves off this reliance on gas by 2040.
The National Economic and Social Council (NESC) has said Ireland needs a long-term strategy to ensure a clean energy supply. That may entail turning fickle renewable sources like wind and solar into a stable reliable energy supply.
For example, it may be possible to use renewable electricity to generate hydrogen, and use the resulting hydrogen as a fuel to generate electricity in times of low solar or wind output.
Research is needed to see if this would work at scale, and at what cost. With three lots of equipment involved – wind turbines to produce the initial electricity, machines to produce hydrogen, and hydrogen-fuelled electricity generators, it’s unlikely to come cheap. Battery storage could also help smooth out fluctuations in renewable energy supply.
We are currently highly dependent on interconnectors to Britain to maintain our crucial energy supply, and that is a vulnerability, particularly with malign actors
Small modular nuclear generators, a technology that is currently being developed internationally, is another possible option. However, nuclear generators are always on and they would not easily fill the gaps in an intermittent renewable-based system.
Further interconnection to the European grid is another option, with the construction of an interconnector to France under way. We are currently highly dependent on interconnectors to Britain to maintain our crucial energy supply, and that is a vulnerability, particularly with malign actors.
Last Monday, Finland charged a Russian skipper and crew with cutting five electricity and telecommunications cables in the Baltic through dragging their ship’s anchor over the sea-bed for 100 kilometres.
The NESC report argues that we need investment in technical capabilities, maritime presence and surveillance to protect our undersea infrastructure. This will require investment in our defence forces. We will also need close co-operation with our neighbours, especially the UK.
In March 2025, the UK and Irish governments published a joint statement announcing increased collaboration on this issue.
With the construction of an electricity interconnector to France, we will also need to collaborate closely with the French government on protecting our vital energy infrastructure.
It is also planned to have a ship with emergency gas supplies permanently connected to the Irish gas network. This would provide an alternative route for gas supplies in the event of a catastrophic disruption to our undersea infrastructure.
