"Green" policies are destroying this country

If countries are going hell for leather into renewables, green energy, evs, data centres, etc., will there be a crunch coming for access to materials?

What the renewables companies do not tell you with their claims that we are paying less for our electricity because of them and we would be paying less again if we threw more money at them is that we are not. We are - and will be under our current plan and pricing policy for ever and a day - paying them the same as we will be paying per MWh for gas.

As we are now with our current plan and pricing is summed up by Mike, a character in Hemingway`s The Sun Also Rises who when asked how he went bankrupt replied "Two ways. Gradually, and then suddenly"

We have already passed that threshold.

The capital costs of offshore wind increased by 70% in the last two years where recently Denmark could not get a single bid for it`s largest ever offering. Same in the U.K. where even after increasing the price to compensate for that increase Orsted walked away from a cfd because it was still financially unviable.

And this is for offshore contracts for 20 years, if the turbines even survive that long, where they will be scrapped and new one replacing them

Strange that governments and scientists around the world disagree. Must really be annoying for people who share your opinion

As opposed to oil which as we can see isn't even a little bit volatile in price haha!

… and what exactly is it that these governments and scientists disagree on in relation to what I posted.

That under our present 37GW offshore + hydrogen plan that consumers would be saddled with a strike price for electricity 4X that we now have where we are consistently in the top three most expensive countries in Europe for electricity ?

Or is it that they disagree with Eirgrid`s - who I imagine know as much if not more about Ireland`s electricity requirements - projections for our 2050 requirements which this current plan is supposed to address that show it will fall short to the extent that by 2050 we will still be burning fossil fuels at the same if not greater rates than we are at present and will be paying billions annually in penalties from 2030 on-wards for doing so ?

Yeah there could be, nobody really knows what the future holds.

What we do know is that there are many many components and materials in wind turbines. There's also a number of different renewable competing energy sources so if wind turbines get too pricey then we can look at solar or hydro

In my opinion it's not going to be as bad as the battles we currently see for oil

Trump has already held Ukraine to ransom over rare earths, was threatening to invade Greenland to get his grubby hands on their minerals, and he has threatened China with tariffs based on their control of rare earths. So that war has already begun.

Wind turbines are already too pricey. Their capital costs alone rose by 70% in less than two years and need replacing every 20 years if you are lucky.

Hydro on a good year provides ~3.50% of our current generation, and as demand increases that % will drop. Hydro pumped storage is a net minus exercise as it takes more energy to pump water up a hill than it will generate flowing back down.

Solar in Ireland during Winter, when our demand is highest, has a capacity factor of 5% or less and it generates DC electricity which has to be converted to AC using inverters. The more solar generated the more inverters required which creates its own problems as the Spanish recently found out when they blacked out the whole of the Iberian peninsula.

“Speaking of Spain what are electricity prices like there at the moment? ”

More than double clean green nuclear powered energy export powerhouse called France to the north of them

the screenshot for today’s prices clearly shows Spain is more than double the price of France while producing 4.5x the CO2

There are communities up and down the country launching legal action against thousands of acres of good farm land being converted into Chinese solar panel fields and industrial battery parks

I’m sure the state might find some state small amount land for a plant let’s say in Dublin docks of few hundred meters on each side next to majority of the state demand

Or instead of spending hundreds of billions build a bunch of connectors to France and ask them to produce clean cheap green electricity for us

You have already posted that the figures I gave were incorrect according to governments and scientists but rather than address when asked for your evidence they are incorrect you ignore and move on to making further incorrect. statements.

Spain does not generate over 70% of its electricity from wind and solar. It generates 41% of its electricity from wind and solar and generates the same from nuclear as it does from solar and imports nuclear from France. It also generates 14.2% of its electricity from hydro compared to our 3.5%. A percentage that is not going to increase here as hydro is tapped out.

Spain`s electricity costs are "pricey". Even more pricey @ €29.07 per 100 kWh - a few cents away from being in the second tier of E.U. most expensive electricity - than Ireland @ €27.54 per 100 kWh.

So are you now going to retract your claim that Spain generates over 70% of its electricity from wind and solar and acknowledge that their electricity is even more "pricey" than ours, as well as your statement that my figures on a strike price to the consumer for this current 37GW wind plan have been shown to be incorrect according to these mysterious governments and scientists ?

Even Denmark has realised that a 100% renewables grid is a fantasy and "that something else is needed" — which has always been a bit of a no brainer as renewables are intermittent and unreliable and cannot provide a base load - and is lifting its 40 year ban on using nuclear.

Solar in Ireland has a capacity factor of 5% or less in Winter. It may have its uses in some areas, but as a stable, reliable national grid provider for here where we have 17.5 hours of darkness during Winter it makes no sense.

That effectively leaves you with wind or nuclear. Nuclear has been providing base load and a reliable supply of electricity for generations in France as well as other countries. In fact French exports of nuclear power has been the major reason why the lights have stayed on in Europe when wind goes off for one of its prolonged sleeps. Wind on its own will never be able to do that without batteries, hydrogen or whatever other extras greens favor as add-ons.

At the end of the day it will come down to the comparative costs of capital expenditure, capacity factor and lifespan of both wind and nuclear, and wind with whatever add-ons, especially offshore wind the basket we are currently putting all our eggs in, has priced itself out of the market.

I don’t think anyone is calling for abandonment of renewables, that money is a sunk cost now

What’s under discussion is whether we continue to pour bad money after good, for ever diminishing returns, at ever increasing costs to consumers, and still fail to become green/cheap/reliable like France has done decades ago

https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/reducing-nuclear-energy-strategic-mistake-eu-chief-says-2026-03-10/

edit 2

https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/reducing-nuclear-energy-strategic-mistake-eu-chief-says-2026-03-10/

Well you don't say Ursula. Barn door and bolted horse.

Denmark is one of the three most consistent European countries for the highest price of electricity. It generates 53% of its electricity from wind with just 10% from solar, with the rest of that 80% figure being biomass at 17%. Predominately wood burning, much of it imported, that even green advocacy groups like Ember and the National Resources Defense Council view as worse for the environment than coal.

Denmark recently could not get a single bid for their largest ever offering of offshore wind contracts, and with Norway not renewing the interconnector between both because they are feed up having their hydro power being drained like a battery and raising their own domestic prices for electricity has Denmark scraping their 40 year ban on nuclear generation. As an arguement for a solar/wind grid Denmark is not a great example now is it ?

I did not say the capacity factor for solar was 5% in Ireland. I said during Winter it is 5%, and I was being generous. It has often gone as low as 3%, and for those 16.5 or 17.5 hours whichever you wish to choose it is 0%.

We have three peak demand times in Ireland. Our highest being in Winter between 5pm - 7pm. with another between 6 am - 10 am. In Winter solar during those times supplies the sum of virtually sfa and never will supply anything more.

Wind and solar in Winter here do not compliment each other. We have had prolonged periods when wind has supplied 6% or less of our requirements. We have presently 2.35GW of installed solar capacity, 40% of our present peak demand requirements which during Winter, even giving solar a generous 5% capacity factor, will provide just 1.7% of our peak demand.

Any system you design must be based on how it performs at its weakest, not at its strongest. Otherwise you are looking at catastrophic failure. If you believe that solar compliments wind here, then when the wind drops to 6% or less for long periods what would be the installed capacity of solar required to make up that missing 94% of generation and at what cost ?

I could work out the installed capacity that would be required, but it would be a bigger waste of time than trying to herd mice at a croosroads.