Epower, a joint venture electricity company established by a consortium led by the chairman of Esat Telecom, Mr Denis O'Brien, and a US power company, GPU International, will compete as a distributor in the deregulated electricity market next February, the company's directors said yesterday.

Mr O'Brien was critical of the ESB, likening its "under-investment" in electricity generation to that of an operator in a third world country. "We have blackouts, bigger customers saying, `Please do not turn up the volume at peak times'." He claimed ESB would be brought "kicking and screaming" into a room to sell electricity at wholesale prices to competitors.

He added that he wanted the market opened more quickly than the 28 per cent liberalisation which will take place in February and the 32 per cent by 2003. "I think at the end of the day, the consumers and SMEs [small to medium-sized enterprises] should get cheap electricity or else should have a choice of a different operator."

An ESB spokesman said the setting up of a wholesale electricity market was a matter for the regulator, Mr Tom Reeves, along with the arrangements to license competitors. He added that the ESB had supply to meet demand, and would be adding a further 160 megawatts (MW) of electricity at Poolbeg to its 4,350 MW capacity within six weeks.

The chairman of Epower, Mr Leslie Buckley, said £200 million (€254 million) would be invested by the company over the next two to three years. It had been preparing for its launch in the past two years and intended to build a gas-fired 390 megawatt power station at one of three unspecified locations.

The company's chief executive, Mr Paul Browne, said Epower combined the expertise of Esat and GPU's experience as a power company in challenging a State monopoly. Funding for Epower's requirements would be carried out on an equal basis by the O'Brien consortium and GPU International. He added that as an electricity supplier, the O'Brien consortium was the majority shareholder, with Mr Leslie Buckley, a management consultant and a former acting chief operating officer of East Telecom, also holding a substantial stake. The company has two GPU directors on its board, Mr Vincent White and Mr Bruce Levy. As an electricity generating company, Epower is jointly owned by the consortium and GPU, Mr Browne added.