Ireland Ready to Upgrade Electricity Grid

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland) -- Ireland's aim to modernise its electricity grids in order to take advantage of renewable energy took a major step forward this week following the award of a €235 million ($312 million) loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB).

The loan to the state-owned Electricity Supply Board (ESB) (Dublin) represents 50% of the proposed €470 million ($624 million) programme to overhaul the ageing infrastructure, which will be delivered by ESB Networks over the next two years. It will fund a number of key projects, such as allowing the transmission and distribution network to handle energy from windfarms and also to improve efficiency and capability of the grid to allow for greater integration of renewable energy sources. The funding will also be used for the technical design phase of a smart metering programme that will be rolled out nationwide in the coming years, as well as the initial installation phase of charging stations for electric vehicles across Ireland.

The news comes just a month after work commenced on the €600 million ($763.8 million) interconnector cable that will connect the electricity grids of Ireland and the U.K. The East-West Interconnector project is a 500-megawatt (MW) link that will be capable of transporting enough energy to power 300,000 homes when it is completed at the end of 2012. For additional information see October 28, 2011, article - Ireland-U.K. Interconnector Project Begins.

"The European Investment Bank has a long standing record of positive support for energy investment in Ireland, not only with this present most welcome support for transmission and distribution assets upgrade but with its previous support for construction of wind farms and the development of Aghada power plant in addition to supporting Ireland's East-West interconnector," said Ireland's Minister for Communications, Energy & Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte, at the signing of the deal.

Plutarchos Sakellaris, European Investment Bank Vice President, added: "Significant and well-planned investment in electricity networks is essential to enable effective use of renewable energy potential, improve energy efficiency through implementation of smart meters and encourage environmentally friendly use of electric cars".

The Irish infrastructure programme will involve the provision of more than over 270 kilometres (km) of new high voltage lines to reinforce existing transmission links from the southwest, west and northwest of Ireland to the main population centres in the east. These areas have "significant wind generation capacity", the ESB noted. In addition, the capacity of more than 8,000km of rural networks will be doubled and 140km of new distribution lines will be installed in Connemara, Co. Galway, to alleviate voltage problems in the area.

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