Energy Crisis

IDA issues warning over Ireland’s ‘expensive and high-risk’ energy system

The state agency made the claim in an uncompromising submission to the energy regulator, while arguing that new plans to impose €100m emergency tariffs on large firms would undermine national competitiveness

Martin Shanahan, chief executive, IDA Ireland: The agency was particularly critical of the proposed increase in block tariffs on large energy-using businesses. Picture: Maxwells

Ireland’s energy system is “increasingly viewed as expensive, unpredictable and relatively high risk”, IDA Ireland has warned.

The inward investment agency has made the claim in a hard-hitting submission to the energy regulator, in which it says “unprecedented” plans to introduce €100 million in emergency tariffs on certain large businesses would also undermine Ireland’s cost-competitiveness and damage the country’s reputation for foreign direct investment.

In a submission to the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities ...