The blockades may be starting to lift, but the latest climbdown by the Government represents a setback for climate policy that will further weaken Ireland’s resilience to global price shocks.
The pros and cons of the carbon tax could be endlessly debated. But set against the backdrop of war in the Middle East and Ireland’s near total reliance on imported fossil fuels for transport and heating fuels, delaying an increase to the carbon tax is beside the point. With or without taxes, fuel costs are revenues that leave the country and enrich petrostates, oligarchs and war criminals. While subsidies can relieve pressure in the short term, sustained high levels of fossil fuel subsidies inhibit renewable energy development and imperil government finances. In the long run, they do more damage than good.
Ireland imports 100 per cent of our liquid fuels and about 80 per cent of natural gas. At nearly 80 per cent in 2024, Ireland’s import dependency is among the highest in Europe, and represents a strategic vulnerability that poses wider risks to national security, according to the International Energy Agency. Effectively, we are at the mercy of global energy prices over which we have virtually no control. You could have protests and blockades every other week, but if global energy prices continue to soar past $100 a barrel, it will be impossible to shield the Irish economy and everyone reliant on fossil fuels from the effects of higher prices and a potential global recession.
Instead of focusing on the carbon tax, we should be discussing why Ireland has among the highest electricity prices in the EU, when electrification is the way out of our fossil fuel dependency. We consistently rank in the top five for household costs and are the highest in the EU for business customers. And the reason? Yet again it’s mostly our import dependency. Despite a big increase in renewable electricity in recent years, Ireland relies on gas for more than 40 per cent of our electricity supply. Energy demand growth from data centres is the most significant factor behind the continued reliance on fossil gas in power generation, according to Prof Hannah Daly of UCC.
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The State has bent over backwards to facilitate the tech sector as US multinationals have too much influence over the policy process. According to a report investigating corporate power by researchers at Maynooth University published in January this year, the tech and data centre sector actively lobbies senior Government officials and policymakers in relation to energy policy. My own research shows that more than 40 per cent of lobbying returns to the Standards in Public Office Commission (Sipo) in the energy category in 2024 originated from just 10 big corporate entities, focused on the integration of data centres into the energy system.
Instead of demanding more fossil fuel subsidies and more climate lethargy, the Opposition parties should be demanding action to reduce Ireland’s electricity prices and questioning how the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities (CRU) balances its obligations under the Climate Act with its policy for data centres. High electricity prices act as a barrier to electrification, which is key to being able to harness our plentiful renewable energy resources.
If the Government were acting on behalf of the public interest, and not just the shoutiest or most influential lobby group, it would be rolling out measures to pause new data centres, promote energy efficiency and help fund diversification of the dairy and beef sectors. But that’s not happening: the 2026 Climate Action Plan was due in December last but has been “delayed”. Also delayed is the Social Climate Plan under the new EU Emissions Trading Scheme directive, which would unlock up to €800 million in finance to offset the costs of the energy transition.
It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that the Government’s climate commitments vanish under pressure from either the populist demands of fuel protesters or those of powerful lobbies behind the scenes. Little by little, it has been dismantling or weakening the climate policy framework by adding carbon-intensive projects to the National Development Plan, dropping or delaying public transport investment and weakening the climate law. It has taken a short-term, transactional approach to satisfying the demands of an aggrieved minority that has no democratic mandate or policy platform. We will all end up paying for this.
Political voices seeking to capitalise on the Government’s current weakness should remember that energy insecurity and fossil fuel dependency affect all sectors of the economy and all householders. Hauliers and agricultural contractors may be particularly exposed to high diesel prices, but they should not be allowed to derail Ireland’s climate change response, which has the backing of a Citizens’ Assembly, and a democratic mandate via legislation passed with an overwhelming majority by the Oireachtas in 2021.
As long as we are hitched to fossil energy to meet more than 80 per cent of our energy requirements, and as long as Ireland’s economic model demands that policymakers cave into the demands of large energy users, our democracy will be defenceless against price shocks. The events of the past week are a distraction from the deeper social, economic and political challenges of climate action.
Sadhbh O’Neill is a climate and environmental researcher
