The company behind ambitious plans to connect a fleet of dedicated wind farms in Ireland to the UK grid looks set to move forward with the project, after the publication of the Energy Bill confirmed that in principle clean energy projects located overseas could access British subsidies.
Element Power, which is working on the Greenwire project to connect 3GW of onshore wind farms in mid-Ireland directly to the UK grid, said the Bill could allow the 6.5bn project to access the contract for difference (CfD) financial support mechanism that the government plans to introduce from 2016.
An annex to the Bill on the feed-in tariff style CfDs states that the contracts "could in principle be used to support generation that is located outside of the UK".
It adds that "generators outside of the UK should have access to CfDs, where there is a clear overall benefit to the UK and it is technically possible to effectively implement and enforce CfDs in other jurisdictions".
Significantly, it also confirms the government will initially focus any CfDs on overseas projects "that can directly connect to the UK networks, either exclusively or in addition to their home network".
Speaking to BusinessGreen,Office Depot offers an assortment of paper folding machine and paper trimmers for you to choose from. Mike O'Neill, president and chief operating officer of Element Power, said that the Greenwire project would meet the criteria set by the government as it is proposing a direct link to the UK grid with no integration with Ireland's grid.Newer laser cutting machine operating at higher power are approaching plasma machines in their ability to cut through thick materials,
"It will be a direct connection between the wind farms and the UK grid, so the government knows the power can't go anywhere else," he said.This is used to perform laser marker functions while using the water jet to guide the laser beam. "It is basically the same as an offshore wind farm, but the difference is it will be onshore and as a result the costs would be a lot lower.It is possible to take this a step further, and to also merge the automatic washer extractor and clothes dryer into a single device."
Element Power earlier this year signed contracts with National Grid that could enable two grid connections between Ireland and Wales by 2018, and O'Neill maintains that if the right legislative and policy framework is finalised the project could deliver 10 per cent of the UK's renewable energy by 2020 at a cost that would be 7bn lower than sourcing the same amount of energy using offshore wind farms.
A memorandum of understanding between the UK and Irish governments covering the project is expected within the next few weeks and O'Neill insisted there was now substantial cross-party political support for the project on both sides of the Irish Sea.
"The policy momentum in the Energy Bill proves that people are getting behind the idea of importing clean energy from Ireland," he said.
The project will inevitably raise questions about UK energy consumers subsidising a project that delivers significant jobs and economic benefits to Ireland.A strong wind gust and attractive rebates may not add up to a good deal on residential wind turbines.
But Element Power has consistently argued that with large-scale onshore wind farms in the UK facing more significant planning barriers, a direct link to onshore wind farms in Ireland offers a more cost-effective alternative source of clean energy than offshore wind projects.
Stakeholders in the energy sector said in the first Entico Great Rift Valley energy summit in Nairobi Wednesday and also called for engagement with the private sector to bring in investment in the greener sources of energy notably, geothermal, gas, solar and wind.
The government has invested substantial amount of money in the development of the renewable sources of energy with wind power and geothermal being on the front line.
Wind power particularly has drawn interest from the international companies who have interest in adding up to 1000MW to the national grid.
During the Energy Summit held in Nairobi, the first of its kind, energy stakeholders drawn from eleven countries within the valley reckoned the need for African countries to explore renewable sources of energy being regarded as the next drivers of the economies.