Sir, – I wish to respond to Michael Kelly of Eirgrid, whose letter of August 22nd, in response to mine of August 17th, clarified for me the efforts of Eirgrid to accommodate more wind electricity generation on our grid. He states that a maximum of 50 per cent has been achieved and they are working towards a maximum of 75 per cent, which, in my opinion, will be a very difficult task. Lest there be any confusion among the public and politicians, I would emphasise that these are maximum values and what is really relevant is the average production from wind.
From the Eirgrid website I have totted up, for the first seven months of this year, the total electricity production (15.04 terrawatt hours or TWh) and that due to wind and hydroelectricity (2.71 TWh), which are lumped together. These renewables thus account for only 18 per cent of our requirements and this reduces to less than 16 per cent for wind alone when the hydroelectric contribution is subtracted. The fact is that wind is so fickle that half of the time our turbines are producing less than 10 per cent of their rated output. The Government policy is to get 37 per cent of our electricity from wind by 2020 (40 per cent from all renewables). I regard this as a very tall order as the problems increase as the penetration increases. It is interesting that the Danes, who are world leaders in wind generation and have been developing it since the 1970s, can manage only about 20 per cent.
As can be seen, renewables have an important role to play, but is not likely to be the whole answer and we must consider all the options for a balanced and sustainable future. – Yours, etc,