186. Deputy Catherine Callaghan asked the Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment the measures in place to ensure that the continued development of data centres is compatible with Ireland's climate targets, energy security and electricity affordability for households; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56440/26]

The Government is committed to delivering a balanced approach to facilitate sustainable data centre demand while also ensuring overall energy security and affordability for consumers and businesses.

The Large Energy User Action Plan (LEAP), published in January 2026, sets out a ‘plan-led’ approach for very large and energy intensive investments, which due to their scale and energy consumption benefit from coordinated national infrastructure planning. A key pillar of LEAP will be to provide a framework for the establishment of green energy parks, in which to co-locate the most energy-intensive large energy user sectors with the supply of renewables and other enabling technologies.

Alongside LEAP, the CRU’s Large Energy Users Connection Policy, published in December 2025, sets out a pathway for new large demand connection applications to the electricity system which addresses risks in relation to security of supply and system constraints and promotes renewable energy targets. Under the new connection policy, new Data Centres are required to develop sufficient renewable energy generation to match 80% of their annual electricity demand.

To ensure ongoing decarbonisation of the electricity system, incentivising greater demand efficiency and flexibility by LEUs is also essential. The National Energy Demand Strategy by CRU sets out a series of actions by the regulator and System Operators to unlock greater demand flexibility.

In addition, Article 12 of the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) includes requirements to enhance the energy efficiency of data centres. Data centres in Ireland, and across the EU, are reporting this information to this EU database. The information will be used to inform future policy at national and EU level, including the establishment of an EU wide rating scheme to measure and promote efficiencies in the energy and sustainability performance of data centres.

The Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) is responsible for electricity connection policy and the economic regulation of the electricity system operators ESB Networks and EirGrid. Electricity Network Tariffs are set every year by the CRU to recover the costs of developing, operating, and maintaining the electricity grid. CRU are progressing a multi-annual Electricity Network Tariff Review project to reform how network charges are levied to ensure costs are fairly distributed across different customers.

Additionally, Government has established the National Energy Affordability Taskforce which is preparing an Energy Affordability Action Plan to identify, assess and implement measures that will enhance energy affordability for households and businesses.