Witnesses and members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that we should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that could be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative to comply with such a direction that I might make. Members attending remotely are reminded of the constitutional requirement that to participate in the confines of the Leinster House complex. This is due to the constitutional requirement that to participate in public meetings, members must be physically present in the confines of the place the Parliament has chosen to sit. In this regard, I ask any members participating via Microsoft Teams to confirm they are on the grounds of the Leinster House complex if they wish to contribute to the meeting. I remind all those in attendance to make sure their mobile phones are switched off or on silent mode.

I thank everyone for attending to discuss energy poverty and related matters. As a committee, we look forward to engaging with them and gaining insights into the means and ways that can alleviate energy costs for families and households while also contributing to greater energy efficiency and sustainability. I welcome Mr. Alan Wyley, chief executive, and Mr. Cathal Lee, non-executive director, EnergyCloud; and Mr. Colin Ahern, chair, and Mr. Peter Madden, Solid Fuel Merchants Ireland, SFMI.

Good morning. I am here today with my colleague Cathal Lee, a co-founder and non-executive director of EnergyCloud. We thank the Cathaoirleach and members of the committee for the opportunity to present. On 23 January 2025, the programme for Government was published and it contained a commitment to explore if legislation could be enacted to divert surplus renewable energy, that would otherwise be wasted, to those in fuel poverty and to explore ways to use surplus renewable energy to help reduce energy poverty, ensuring that renewable energy benefits all communities. Despite this commitment, in the year to 31 December, we saw 1,476 GWh of renewable wind energy dispatched down, which is enough to heat 492 million tanks of hot water and has an average retail value of €523 million. This is an average of more than €1.4 million of clean renewable wind energy being dispatched down, or wasted, every single day since the programme for Government was published.

The ESRI estimates that more than 550,000 homes are in energy poverty in Ireland. That is approximately 1.5 million people. It is an unnecessary and unforgivable scandal that these numbers persist with the levels of wasted renewable energy that I have outlined. If this waste were put to use to tackle energy poverty, this would be a social problem that could be solved. According to our partner, Clúid Housing, energy poverty is not a marginal issue, but a growing crisis. Many of Clúid’s residents live on low incomes, and rising energy costs can push them to make impossible choices: heat or eat. Clúid’s tenancy sustainment team sees this reality every day and it has residents who have just €20 a week for heating. Some households simply do not turn on their heating because they fear the cost. This is not just about comfort; this is about dignity, health, and the ability to sustain a tenancy.

To help those in the room who are fortunate enough to not be experiencing energy poverty to understand the lived experience of those who are, and to see what a huge impact using the waste could have, this is an email we got last week from an EnergyCloud user: "I just did all my kitchen cupboards without putting a single kettle of water on all thanks to your fantastic project, thank you so much EnergyCloud". Another resident said: "Great! Unbelievable actually I haven't had anything free like that in a long time. The immersion was always consuming my electricity I found it hard to keep up."

EnergyCloud presented to the Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands in June 2024. Its report recommended that EnergyCloud should be supported to help us to scale our initiative to provide free water and heat to those in energy poverty. In addition, the National Economic and Social Council, NESC, Secretariat Report No. 36 – Energy Transition as an Opportunity to Eliminate Energy Poverty, in May 2025, states, "Support for social enterprises such as EnergyCloud... should be considered so that they can operate at a bigger scale." While EnergyCloud is happy to receive support and work with the Government and the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, regarding pilots, to some degree that is missing the point. This is not about EnergyCloud. It is about energy poverty and political leadership.

When will the Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment, in conjunction with the Minister for Social Protection, announce that as a Government, wasted renewable energy is no longer acceptable and that we, as a country, want to try and use surplus renewable energy to help those in energy poverty and only dispatch down, or waste, as a last resort? Without this announcement from the Ministers and the Government we know that nothing will be done until at least the budget, because no one will be tasked with using the waste, no one will be responsible for the waste and no one will do anything with this waste for those in energy poverty. By the time the budget comes around this Government will have missed a €1 billion opportunity to end energy poverty, as we wasted over €500 million in renewable energy in 2025 and will see at least that number in 2026. Even if we ignore the €3 billion in waste since 2017, in the first two years of this Government, despite it being in the programme for Government, we will see €1 billion in wasted renewable energy that could have been used to tackle and indeed end energy poverty.

I thank the Chair, Deputies and Senators for the invitation to speak on behalf of Solid Fuel Merchants Ireland on the issue of energy poverty. Our members are the coal, briquette, wood and smokeless fuel merchants who open their yards and shops every day in towns and villages across the country. They know their customers by name. They are often the first to notice when an older person has stopped collecting fuel, when a family is making do with one heated room, or when someone is slipping quietly into fuel poverty. For many households, particularly in rural Ireland and in older, poorly insulated homes, locally supplied solid fuel is not a lifestyle choice, but is the only practical way to stay warm.

SFMI fully supports the State's clean air and decarbonisation objectives. Bituminous coal is already banned for sale in the State, and our members operate within a strong regulatory framework on fuel quality and sulphur content. The challenge we see on the ground is that if compliant local retailers are not supported, the space is opened up for unregulated, cash-only operators selling poor quality or illegal fuel. That undermines air quality, public health and, critically, the protection the social welfare system is meant to provide . From our perspective, three points are vital if we are serious about tackling energy poverty in a fair and practical way.

First, fuel poverty is experienced locally. It is experienced in the moment pensioners have to decide whether they can afford another bag of fuel from the local yard, or when lone parents cannot stretch their fuel allowance far enough to buy from a compliant retailer. National policy must recognise that reality and work with, not against, the network of small, often family-run, fuel businesses that keep people warm.

Second, if we want public money to protect vulnerable households, we must make sure it reaches the right people through the right channels. Currently, the fuel allowance is a cash payment. Once it is paid, the State has no visibility on whether it is used to buy compliant fuel or whether it is spent with a tax-compliant local retailer or recipients feel forced to turn to cheaper, illegal or poor-quality products. That is a weakness both from an anti-poverty perspective and an environmental one.

Third, properly regulated local retailers can, and should be, part of the solution. Our members are already subject to environmental, safety and trading standards. They are rooted in their communities. With the right framework, they can help to ensure that every euro of fuel support translates into safe, compliant heat in people’s homes, rather than leakage into the shadow economy. That is why SFMI is bringing forward an innovative fuel voucher proposal, linked to an EPA solid fuel register for retailers. The core idea is simple. Instead of paying the fuel allowance entirely in cash, it would be issued as a fuel voucher. That voucher could only be redeemed with registered, compliant fuel retailers and energy suppliers. It would not change who qualifies for the allowance, or the total support available. It would change how that support is delivered and accounted for. Such a system would achieve four things. It would guarantee that public support is spent on legal, compliant fuel, consistent with the State’s air quality and sulphur standards and the existing ban on smoky coal. It would keep money circulating in local economies, sustaining jobs and services in rural and disadvantaged communities. It would give the State a clear line of sight on where subsidised fuel is being bought, making it easier to target enforcement at unscrupulous operators and it would give greater protection to vulnerable households, by reducing the risk of being pushed towards unsafe or poor-quality fuels simply because they are cheaper on the day.

We are not asking the committee to choose between climate action and social protection. We are saying that, if designed correctly, the fuel allowance can address both. It can keep people warm and well, while reinforcing - not undermining - Ireland’s clean air and heating transition, by directing support through legitimate, tax-compliant channels that help sustain the public funding required for retrofits and climate initiatives. However, that will only happen if the thousands of small- and medium-sized fuel businesses are seen as partners in delivery, not as an afterthought.

Our message is straightforward. Local solid fuel merchants are on the front line of energy poverty. They must be supported if we want to ensure that older people, low-income families and rural households do not fall through the cracks. Solid Fuel Merchants Ireland stands ready to work with this committee, the Department of Social Protection and industry colleagues to refine and implement a voucher-based fuel allowance that is fair, workable and future-proof.

I thank committee members and look forward to their questions.

I appreciate the opening statements from Mr. Wyley and Mr. Ahern. I invite members to discuss them and remind those participating remotely to use the raise hand function on MS Teams and cancel it when they have spoken. I call Deputy Guirke.

I thank the witnesses for coming in today.

It was mentioned that 300,000 households are in some form of arrears on electricity bills, with an average debt of €471. On long-term arrears, there is a big spike of those in arrears for more than 90 days, or three months. There were 175,000 gas customers in arrears, which represents one in four gas customers and their average debt is €213. With the Government wasting so much money on surplus renewable energy - the figure of €523 million was mentioned - what would it cost to direct that to the households that need it the most? It seems crazy. As was said, nothing happens here until a budget is coming up when we can put these proposals to the Government. Will the witnesses explain how that €523 million could be diverted to the households that need it most and what it would cost the Government?

I thank the Deputy for the question. It is an excellent question. The first thing to stress is that the Government and the country are already paying for this waste. There is no additional cost to using it because we are already paying for it. It is important to say that at the outset.

We have some good ideas for how it could be used and the exact cost of doing so would all come from the political leadership and the policies we decide to use. In other words, we are in a vacuum at the moment because there is no political leadership or policy on this issue. The first thing we would call for is a decision, an announcement and a strategy to say we will use this waste. That is the first step because nothing can be calculated otherwise.

Once that has been done, we can get into the nuts and bolts of it. In our pre-budget submission, for example, we suggested what we call a social tariff. It could be defined as a rebate or credit, like the universal energy credits from a few years ago. From an energy poverty perspective, we did not support the universality of those credits, but we did support the concept of giving credits to people who need them. Something similar could be done using the waste. There would not be an additional cost. There is a precedent that shows money can be transferred from the Exchequer to the retailers to the consumer. We have that precedent so that is one way it could be done.

For example, when there is waste in the system, between 11 p.m. and 8 a.m., everyone could have free electricity. That would be our definition of what a tariff might look like. People might ask how to come up with the list. We talked about people who are in arrears and we have that list. We have the list of people on the fuel allowance and we have the list of people on social welfare. Therefore, it would be possible to quite quickly come up with a list to target those in energy poverty. It is like all these things. No one expects the Government to go from 0 mph to 100 mph in one step, but if we start, we can start measuring it, see what works best and decide how to adjust the policy as we go. I hope that answers the Deputy's question. They are our initial thoughts.

It might be helpful to spread it to all Members of the Dáil. EnergyCloud might need to come into the audiovisual room to give a presentation to all Members to see if we can come up with something if we are all together on this going forward.

My next question is for the SFMI. Unless the SEAI grants are 100% grants, people will not be able to afford to put these measures into their homes. Many of the people I deal with live day to day. It is heat or eat. SEAI grants have been talked about and everyone is working towards a cleaner environment, but unless they are 100% grants, it will be hard. They need to be paid for upfront because the people I deal with do not have the money to pay costs upfront and then claim them back. That is an obstacle to people turning away from solid fuel. Perhaps the SFMI does not want people to turn away from solid fuel, but in any case that is one of the obstacles I come across on a daily basis.

SFMI spoke about where people go to buy a bag of coal or whatever and said the fuel allowance might need not to be a cash payment as it is at the moment. It is hard for people who are on the breadline not to be able to use that money however they see fit. If they can buy fuel for €1 less somewhere else, they have no choice. That is the case for many of the people I deal with anyway. I do not know what the SFMI's answer to that might be.

I totally agree with the Deputy. We are on the front line of fuel poverty. We see it every day. We know people cannot afford to retrofit or improve their insulation without some serious help. However, a scheme like this would be self-generating. If we can put a fuel voucher system in place that delivers accountability from supply straight to delivery to the customer, it would generate carbon tax. There is a massive amount of illegal activity at the moment in solid fuel so it would generate additional funds for the Government through carbon tax, which would be redistributed to the people who need it most for retrofitting doors, windows and everything else. We have serious issues at the moment with illegal fuel coming into the country. It is high in sulphur and smoke. It is bituminous coal. It causes horrendous problems for the environment and people's health.

As we know, a huge number of deaths are attributed to bad air quality every year. Illegal fuel is costing the State millions every year through carbon tax fraud and VAT fraud. A system like the one we have proposed would specifically target the people who need it most by generating extra funds that are redistributed through carbon tax payments for retrofitting and fuel allowance.

We know people are under severe pressure. We are under severe pressure too but there are rules and regulations on solid fuel in this country that have to be adhered to.

There are rules.

We are compliant and we are implementing Government policy on the ground to our disadvantage.

I thank all of the witnesses for their opening statements and sending them in advance. It is great to have a conversation about fuel poverty but it is also great to have solutions in front of us. That is what I see and clearly hear. I do not know if the Minister, Deputy Dara Calleary, has full responsibility for this or if his remit covers all of it because when we talk about fuel poverty, a lot of it sits within the climate brief.

The first time I heard of EnergyCloud, I did not understand the mechanism. It is important for anybody listening to understand it. Has it been piloted? How does the water get into the pumps? How does a person get up in the morning and have hot water in their copper cylinder? I am not an engineer and I could not get my head around this. Could the witnesses answer those questions in two minutes because I want to ask some other questions. It is important to understand the mechanism.

I can answer in two minutes for the Senator.

Great.

We are running a couple of pilots across different technologies. The one we began with was a smart immersion controller. It takes about an hour to 90 minutes to install. You remove the existing immersion switch and put on this smart immersion controller. We can access it remotely. When there is curtailment or waste in the system, we remotely switch it on and heat up the water. The person does nothing but wakes up in the morning to a free tank of hot water. At the end of the month, we send a report to the retailer saying Anne Rabbitte used this amount of energy this month and she will then get a credit for that. It costs the resident nothing.

That is where we started and now we are rolling out to do batteries, heat pumps, smart storage heaters and other technologies. The basic premise is that we join up when there is curtailment in the system, remotely access the device and provide the free benefit to the resident at that point.

Perfect. That is smart technology at its best. In the statement, Mr. Wyley also said EnergyCloud was partnered with Clúid. Is it partnering with differing approved housing bodies, AHBs? Could Mr. Wyley tell us a little bit about that?

We work through local authorities and approved housing bodies, including Clúid, Tuath, Co-operative Housing Ireland, Focus Ireland, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul and county councils right across the country. In Dublin, we work with Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council and South Dublin County Council but we work right across the country, for example, in Offaly and Cork, and we are about to kick off in Galway, Longford, Roscommon and so on. We work right across the country with local authorities and approved housing bodies.

I will go back to a commitment in the programme for Government. My colleagues, Deputy Paul McAuliffe, and the Minister of State, Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan, did a lot of work on this with the previous committee. My understanding is that EnergyCloud works with the local authorities and approved housing bodies as a start to ensure all their houses are digitally enabled for smart technology to be able to take the surplus. Is that correct?

That is absolutely correct and we are working our way through that. The Senator mentioned the programme for Government and the key thing is the policy on this. As a small charity, we are not trying to solve this on our own. We are trying to get the Government to engage on a policy level. There are 550,000 homes in energy property. With the best will in the world, EnergyCloud will never get to 550,000 homes. It is not even a sensible objective for us. What is sensible is for the policy to say the Government will use the waste to help those 550,000 homes, if that makes sense.

I thank Mr. Wyley. That is a really good segue into solid fuel. Mr. Ahern talks spoke about regulated and unregulated fuel. I do not want to get into that but I want to understand who Solid Fuel Merchants Ireland is? The general public do not know who is or who is not within that catchment.

We are a representative body, which was established in 2022 following the introduction of the solid fuel regulations. Initially, we were comprised of 51 businesses which solely depend on the sale of solid fuels and gas. We are based across most towns and cities in the country so we have a very good geographical spread. We had no representation and we had to change. We know the market is changing and we want to change with it. We adopted an approach that we would co-operate, rather than be confrontational, and engage with and lobby the Government. We are a proactive partner highlighting the issues affecting the sector and how we can address them.

That is exactly what we have done. We have met with numerous Ministers, TDs and groups to highlight the issues. We have worked very closely with Departments over the last couple of years as well. We have worked very closely with the Department of the environment on the new air pollution Bill too.

We are not climate deniers. We are responsible business owners. We know we have to change and we are changing. However, it is very hard for us to decarbonise and change when there is so much illegal activity in the marketplace. I do not want to keep harping on about it but it is having a massive impact on people and business. The State's money is leaving the State. The Exchequer is losing millions every year. That is exactly who we are. We are solid fuel merchants. We are small coal and fuel businesses but we are changing and decarbonising.

The reality is that not everybody has switched to air to water heating yet or other systems like that. As we heard from EnergyCloud, using smart technology means not everybody needs to do the full conversion. We need to give people choices. People are entitled to make their own choices and if they want to burn smokeless coal or put timber or turf in their fire, as long as it comes from the regulated market, that is their choice.

On the voucher, I assume some people will say we are removing rights from them if we go down the road of the voucher scheme. I actually think it is the right way to do it. Could Mr. Ahern tell us a little more about the voucher?

A fuel voucher should be used for fuel and nothing else. It should be spent in accordance with the law and rules and regulations. We are not looking for a monopoly on vouchers for solid fuel - we are just one of the beneficiaries. It would apply across all energy sources, whether electricity, gas, oil or solid fuel. It is exactly that. We want to change the way the system is administered. Instead of cash going out, we want it to be a voucher. A voucher provides full accountability and allows resources to be targeted, from a governmental point of view, straight at the most vulnerable people, ensuring the money is circulated to those people through this voucher scheme.

We are not trying to remove people's rights. If anything, we want resources to be targeted. Everyone wants accountability. There should be accountability for how the State's money is spent. The Opposition is looking for the State to be accountable, as we all are, and this provides complete accountability. It is all about consumer protection and looking after the customer. We are looking after the most vulnerable customers.

The witnesses are very welcome. Senator Rabbitte asked some of the questions I wanted to ask in order to get my head around EnergyCloud and how it works. Mr. Wyley gave a very good explanation. To me, it sounds too good to be true. Given that it is a really good idea, why is it not being rolled out? Are there any downsides? If people find out about it, understand how it works and want to get involved, why would it need it to be Government policy?

On the technology, did EnergyCloud receive any Government grants to develop its business model? Has it been backed by the Government? Where there is a surplus of renewable energy, is it only available when there is not high demand?

I know it is a good idea but sometimes the energy is maybe available when people do not need it.

It is good that EnergyCloud is working with housing associations and social housing bodies but the squeezed middle is hurting most, particularly older people who may not be in social housing. There is a lot in that; I am sorry.

I might take three of the Senator's four questions and ask my colleague to take the one on Government backing, if that is okay.

On the first question as to why this needs to be policy and why we cannot roll it out to everybody, we are a small, private charity, so for us to try to open the doors to the whole country is just not feasible or possible without the Government policy. Using the waste is critical. We are paying, as a country, €523 million for the waste. If the Government, as it has currently decided, does not want to use the waste and will not use it despite it being in the programme for Government, then obviously that policy will never get off the ground. That is really important. We need political leadership around that, which is really important. It is not just the Minister, Deputy Dara Calleary, but it obviously cuts across climate. We were in with the energy committee in December on that.

Second, the Senator is quite correct. It is at times of curtailment. For wind, that is typically between 11 p.m. and 8 a.m. Some of this would involve changing behaviours, for sure. You want to get demand up during that time because it takes it away from peak and that helps decarbonise the system as well because you do not have to have oil and gas generation going on at peak to meet the demand. That is really important. You can help people use it during the night, with their dishwashers or heating their homes, as we are doing with the heat pump trial and so on. There is stuff that can be done outside peak.

The Senator is 100% right about social housing. There are 550,000 homes in energy poverty. About 180,000 of them are social homes, between approved housing bodies and local authorities. Simple maths tells us that twice as many homes are either privately owned or rented. We would love to get to them. That is another reason Government policy so critical because it is really hard for us to get to them on our own. In some ways, it might be almost impossible for us to get there on our own. Those people will definitely be left behind without a change in Government strategy. I hope that answers three of the Senator's four questions. I will hand over to Mr. Lee.

The last part of the Senator's question obviously relates to why this is not happening immediately and what the barrier is. Is it technical? In reality, what all of us have seen in the past 15 to 20 years is a transformation in how transport, heating and the electrification of everything in our society is happening. In parallel with all of that, the rules and regulations around the billing and cost of energy have been slow to adapt. We must always design to protect the consumer.

Seven or eight years ago, as Mr. Wyley said, there was about €50 million of waste from renewable energy and that was the cost of having this transition. Now it is €500 million per year. It is no longer a rounding error but a cost that is being borne by everyone. Therefore, it requires slightly different thinking because the old rules currently do not work. If there is that volume of waste, I would challenge members to put to the regulators and State agencies a question, asking them what adaption they have done to their rules that has allowed €500 million of energy be wasted. That is probably a better way of positioning it.

To be constructive, if we think of the Government's plan on housing, the social housing element of that is 72,000 homes between now and 2030. There will be a significant capital investment in that. Within that, probably in all cases, there will be a heat pump installed. Those heat pumps are going to be installed with no communication capacity where the grid can turn them on when there is surplus. That is a waste. If there are to be 72,000 homes and, for simplicity, the heat pump element in each will cost €10,000, that will amount to nearly €750 million of investment from the State. What we are saying is to direct policy so that every time we upgrade a house with an immersion controller, heat pump, battery or whatever else, it is enabled to be a resource for the grid that can be turned on. That would be transformative because it does not require additional voted capital expenditure to the Department of housing. If there is going to be expenditure on these houses in any event, we are saying we must make sure the policy is right as, otherwise, we will have another €1 billion wasted in the next two years and no new capital expenditure. All the capital expenditure done by the State will have created these assets that are not connected and unable to accept surplus energy.

I will come back in. I realise I did not answer one of the Senator's question. We have received no Government funding to date. We are meeting the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, for the first time next week. We have a call with it. We have met the Department and the Minister but we have not met the SEAI and we have never received any Government funding. By the way, we are not asking for Government funding. We are asking it to use the waste, to be really clear.

Who pays for the new immersion heating systems that are put in?

We do. EnergyCloud does, through privately raised funds. We have received donations from large corporate donors like SSE, Amazon, Ørsted and others. We use that money to pay for these.

The Senator is out of time. She can come back again in a minute. I call Deputy Willie Aird.

With over 40% of households in energy poverty, what barriers limit initiatives like excess renewable energy redistribution? Which legislative or regulatory changes could help deliver low-cost or free heat to the vulnerable households that Deputy Johnny Guirke alluded to?

That is very good question. With respect to everybody involved, Mr. Lee just touched on it. The system has not really adapted to the new world. I would respectfully suggest to all concerned that inertia is the biggest single barrier. We are already paying for the waste, so the money is gone. It is beyond belief that, as a country and a Government, we think that is okay, especially as it is in the programme for Government. We believe it is inertia, first and foremost. Mr. Lee touched on the housing issue but in the UK, they have announced a direction of travel whereby all new heat devices going into homes have to be smart. They want that to happen by 2027. We are asking the Minister for housing to do the same thing in Ireland. Similarly, there is no reason the Minister for energy or Minister for Social Protection could not announce that the Government is now going to start delivering on its commitment in the programme for Government by using the waste.

We need to bring the Minister for housing in to the committee to ask him to do this. Is that correct?

It would be the Minister for climate.

The Ministers for Social Protection and energy are the two most relevant Ministers in this regard.

That is our job. The witnesses are familiar with the Galway NetZeroCities pilot. What lessons could be scaled nationally to support energy communities, especially in rural or low-income areas with limited infrastructure and capacity?

I do not wish to sound like a broken record - I think we are all old enough to remember records - but the first step is the waste. If we were going to use the waste, in local communities you could then say, for example, there are local constraints or curtailment in Galway tonight. You could then say that everyone in Galway is getting free electricity between 11 p.m. and 8 a.m. That could obviously look after residents who are in energy poverty but it could also cover homeless shelters and community centres or halls. These are things that could be done to help build out these energy communities. We think that would be a fabulous thing to do because right now we are restricted. We are only looking after residents in social houses but, as Senator O'Reilly pointed out, there is a huge body of people who are not in social houses who need our help, particularly in rural communities. If that approach were taken, it could start with a couple of pilots in a few different counties.

It is all down to the waste - this word we are talking about all day. We have to try to get our heads around that.

Yes, of course. Ultimately, the first step is to announce we are going to use it and then we have to work out the how. That is the question. There are different suggestions and we do not claim to have all the answers.

Beyond short-term supports, what long-term policy reforms in the social protection, housing or energy markets would reduce the number of households?

The Deputy is referring to energy poverty. With €500 million a year, I think we could solve energy poverty.

We are back to the same thing. We are going to talk about this €500 million all day.

I think the point about it is that it is such an enormous number that if we just ignore that and we pretend there is some other magic wand we can use. I am not saying there are not other things we could do. Of course, there are. The first and most pressing thing, as a country and as a Government, is to at least start there. Once you start, you get momentum. You start measuring and then other things can come up and there will be other ideas. We do not claim to have all the answers but we have a few suggestions which the Deputy has mentioned already. The first thing is we need a bit of a strategy and some political leadership perhaps.

I have a quick question about solid fuel vouchers. Should vouchers be given to people who should then be directed to legitimate distributors? Is that what Mr. Madden is saying?

We are very much like the two gentlemen here. We are identifying a leakage in the system. We are paying record amounts of carbon tax and there is carbon tax scheduled until 2030. It is putting a lot of pressure on us and on consumers. When it goes into the taxation system and comes back out in the fuel allowance system, there is leakage there where illegal product has gone rife on the system.

Who is policing that, or who should be policing it?

We have been with different bodies, Departments and local authorities, and then we have been directed to Revenue. Local authorities are getting more budgeting for it but some local authorities are better than others at it.

I spent all my life on a local authority. In an ideal world, Mr. Madden would want the local authority policing this, going to distribution centres of people who were doing it and checking. Is that right?

Ideally, we would like a task force because this would provide a cost saving in the long run.

Roughly on a percentage basis, how much is the leakage? That might be a difficult question. I am just asking.

It is very hard to quantify. We can quantify safely €20 million. That is a safe estimate, just on carbon tax, and looking at our own economic report for our own sector. We have met with the Association of Irish Local Government and it is very difficult for local authorities to go out and police activity. An awful lot of activity is illegal, done under cover of darkness, in the back of vans or in trailers. It is people taking money from vulnerable people, and taking it outside the State and it is gone. That is very clear.

A voucher would solve all this.

We are just one part of this solution. To go back to the local authorities, if we have a voucher system in place that would give local authorities a database of approved, certified retailers within their area that are delivering quality fuel to vulnerable people. Therefore, the burden is lessened in the local authorities.

Then there will not be an option of whether to use it for food or heat.

A fuel voucher is for fuel. If the fuel voucher is being used for food, it is not working for fuel. If it is being used for something else, it is not working for fuel.

I understand exactly what you are saying.

We are on the front line of fuel poverty here. We know the people who are coming in. I will give the Deputy a quick indication. This year, which has been worse than any other year, we have seen a huge amount of people coming into our yards or premises with two or three different cards. The payments are failing. They are just under terrible financial difficulty. We would extend credit to a lot of those people until their next fuel allowance or social welfare payment comes in. We are deep-rooted in communities. We see the impact of this, and it is huge. We see the illegal activity in this country at the moment in terms of solid fuel. Most of that is coming into the State and most of the money that is being spent, even if people have their own personal choice where they spend that money, it is illegal activity and that money is gone.

Thank you, my time is up.

On my behalf, can Mr. Wyley advise us as to what the smart meter is and how much it costs his organisation to put them in?

Immersion controllers are about €225 for the device and it costs from €250 to €300 to put it in, so we could say €500 per home total. For batteries and smart storage heaters, they are a bit more expensive but they are giving longer duration benefit. They are heating the homes as well. It depends on the technology but it is anything from €500 to €4,000 or €5,000 per home. One thing to point out is that even though batteries are a key part of EirGrid and ESB's current strategy, they are not granted-aided by SEAI, which makes very little sense to us. We certainly recommend that should be looked at. I also believe solar PV is not covered in the warmer homes scheme, which in conjunction with batteries would seem to be a no-brainer. There is a good bit of work to be done with the grant system for sure. For us with the immersion controllers, we did that on purpose. We started with a cheap immersion controller. It only takes an hour to put in, there is no retrofitting and you get the benefit that evening. It is €500. For a small, private charity, that is what we did. It demonstrates the linkage-----

How many clients would you have for the controller?

We have hundreds of homes live now and will have thousands live later this year. We are also investing a lot of our own money in the pilots around batteries, smart storage heaters and heat pumps. We think that is the future rather than the immersion controllers. That is what we are doing next.

There is a really interesting point there which is about the use of existing assets, or use of assets that the State or approved housing bodies are going to be putting in anyway. That is the key point in all of this. Deputy Aird was asking what the impediment is. Every single renewable energy asset, wind farm or solar farm, is connected to every single house in Ireland. The cables are owned by the State. That is a State asset. It is managed by two entities, EirGrid and ESB. That is an asset to look at what we could do, especially when we imagine putting lots of hot water cylinders or batteries aggregated together. That becomes its own large battery that can take the surplus and come to all of us. Rather than an individual householder having to figure out the flows of energy, it is done for them at an automated level by EnergyCloud. In the example Mr. Wyley was talking about, the hundreds of homes, the resident does not have to do a thing other than use the hot water. That is the key point about using all the bits that are already in place rather than introducing a new scheme where people have to learn and download things.

That was part of my next question. How do you know there is spare electricity tonight, for example, and where to divert it to? Can it be diverted from Cork to Donegal or from Dublin to Galway?

That is a great question. We are connected to EirGrid's publicly available system so we know when there is curtailment. That is when we know there is dispatch down happening and so on. That is when we switch on the devices remotely and that is how we do it. In terms of moving stuff, it is just the grid. When you turn on your switch or immersion, you do not know where that energy was generated. It just came out of the wire. Of course, in the system there are local constraints. Sometimes it is hard to move energy from A to B. We know that. That is why the policy around this is very important. If we have good policy, we can use it locally or nationally as is appropriate. If I may, on Mr. Lee's point about using existing assets, it is a really brilliant point. There are thousands of heat pumps that have already been paid for and installed around local authority and approved housing body homes. We should be able to access them remotely and that is what we are doing right no; we are putting in the technology. That technology should already be in. When those heat pumps were selected, because of a lack of policy on it, they were put in and, if I may say, they are dumb devices that we cannot access remotely. It is a terrible waste and we should not repeat that mistake with the 72,000 new homes.

If there is a local authority or approved housing body house being built in Cork at the moment, can the council or the approved housing body put in the cost of EnergyCloud's device as part of the retrofit programme to Government? Are they getting approved?

I would suggest it is not our device at all. I think they could just request in their tender to make sure this is demand-flexible or can be accessed remotely. EnergyCloud does not have to be involved at all if it is done right upfront. Our objective is to take ourselves away once the problem is solved. We are not trying to get ourselves in the middle of the problem. For all the new builds and retrofits, there should be no need for EnergyCloud because it should be put in.

Of the local authorities and approved housing bodies EnergyCloud is dealing with, how many are doing that at the moment?

None, because the policy is not there.

Right now, if you ask them to do it, they agree with the logic of it but they say that is not Government policy right now, so they are not going to ask for it because nobody else is. It is a missed opportunity.

My final questions are for Mr. Ahern and Mr. Madden in terms of the fuel voucher. What will it look like? Will it be a paper voucher, something that is collected, electronic or come to people's phones every week? How do the witnesses envisage that will be the case?

That is a very good question. That would be a digital voucher, a card for digitally excluded households or a paper voucher. There will be different options because there are different rural areas. Some people do not have widely available apps on their phones. We have a lot of elderly people on it. We hope it would be physical cards and paper vouchers would be available.

I appreciate that. We will go for round two. The limit is about three minutes.

It is fairly frustrating when we talk about climate action and different things and we stop the production of briquettes in our own country and import them 9,000 miles. We can talk about shooting ourselves in the foot in some instances. A good start would be the local authority housing. Mr. Lee said that there are about 72,000 local authority houses and 3,500 are in my own county of Meath. At the moment, if a house was looking for windows and doors, there is a very small budget. In Meath, it could be a couple of hundred thousand towards windows and doors. There needs to be a serious injection of cash put into these projects if we are going to go anywhere. A good start would be the 72,000 local authority houses. It is mostly people who are struggling a bit who are in those local authority housing.

The 72,000 are the homes that are going to be built in the next five years as part of the Government housing plan on social, affordable and local authority homes. Let us not make the same mistake, in that all the infrastructure that has been built in the past five or ten years to a very high standard, which is great, but those assets that have been paid for by the Exchequer are dumb technology. They cannot be turned on remotely when there is surplus. All the ones that are about to be built are a policy change. We are not writing a tender document. We are saying to the people who are doing the tender documents to make sure when they are buying the heat pump that the manufacturers know that the device needs to be demand flexible. The UK Government has already announced this to come in next year. The manufacturers know this is coming and there is a change. However, when one goes to speak to someone in a local authority, they will use the existing template which allows the manufacturers to give them the stuff at a lower spec. That is a waste.

It seems crazy. Is there any way of doing the existing local authority housing stock?

There is. We are doing that. We just started a couple of pilots. We are doing it on a relatively small scale. There is about 180,000 existing social houses in Ireland between the local authorities and the approved housing bodies. A little meter can be put in to remotely access it. It is a couple of hundred quid. That is what we are trialling right now. It is possible to go back and do it. As Mr. Lee said, it is a terrible waste if we make the same mistake again.

It is great to show up to a meeting when you have got solutions. One of things I was thinking about when Mr. Ahern was talking earlier on was that I assume, as part of the whole voucher system, the businesses would also do the delivery as part of it, particularly for the older cohort of people and that it would be a full wraparound support. I assume those vulnerable or at-risk cohort of people who would be known within our community if we had another Storm Éowyn in the morning.

Correct.

That is part of the whole wraparound service.

If we still had nearly 700,000 houses using solid fuel on a weekly basis and 200,000 of those houses were using it is as a primary source of heating and the legitimate fuel businesses disappeared tomorrow, then we would be opened up to unscrupulous dealers and completely unregulated fuel coming into the country. It would have a huge impact on people's health and revenue going to the Government.

On that figure of 700,000, there is a tie over between what Solid Fuel Merchants Ireland provides and what EnergyCloud provides. Coming from rural Ireland, I have a complete understanding that a house might not always have its back boiler connected to what its solid fuel would be. Mr. Ahern referenced the copper cylinders that are doing the hot water drop. At the same time, those families also have the range on to cook. There is a connection between both offerings here this morning.

I apologise for cutting across the Senator but that voucher could be used for EnergyCloud as well. It is across a different spectrum of supply. They can use that voucher for ESB and different things as well. It is not solely for solid fuels. We are just trying to regulate the whole sector because it is completely unregulated at the moment.

To take it to the next step, that is what we need to do here from an energy poverty point of view. We know the Minister for Social Protection is committed because he is paying fuel allowance already. What we need to do is to get the buy in of other Ministers. That would be my understanding. The Minister we need to be talking to for that buy in would have to be the Minister for climate. Do the witnesses agree? We need to know that answer.

That is 100%. When we attended the Joint Committee on Climate, Environment and Energy in December that was a very clear ask. We asked the committee to write to the Minister and ask him to announce the strategy to use it. As EnergyCloud, we cut across housing and social protection as well. It does not have to be the Minister for energy. It could be a whole-of-government decision. It should be a whole-of-government decision. Political leadership in the first instance probably belongs with the Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment.

My question may have been answered. What is the difference in cost between a demand flexible heat pump and dumb heat pump?

That is a great question. It is immaterial. One might pay €8,000 or €10,000 for a heat pump to put in this chip. The manufacturers took this out because no one was asking for it. This technology has been around for years. It is cents. I imagine when they charge a person they will round it up and might charge €100 or something for it. It is immaterial.

I apologise for getting to it in the previous round of questioning. Mr. Ahern mentioned briquettes in his statement. Where are the briquettes coming from now?

Bord na Móna stopped producing briquettes. WillowWarm is a company based in Ireland and is a biomass company. It produces a wooden briquette. It is probably the only one left in the country that is producing a biomass briquette. It is hard to believe that we are importing briquettes into this country after getting rid of briquettes that we produced ourselves here. There are peat briquettes and lignite briquettes coming into the country. For us, it is a serious problem that we got rid of our own industry. If anything, at a time of global uncertainty with Brexit, Covid and wars, we should be self-sufficient. Getting rid of something we were producing ourselves and not looking at bringing in a wood chip product and making it biomass is crazy. To answer the Senator's question, nearly everything is being imported into the country at the moment.

Mr. Ahern said about a 10% to 25% reduction in revenue recently to his business. Is that because people are changing or is it Government policy? Did the witnesses see the new Government campaign that was asking people to question whether they should light fires?

I saw that. It was very unfair to people and vulnerable old people. We had them ringing up asking if it was okay for them to light their fires. It was crazy. The problem is that we are regulated, certified and clean. When they say not to light fires, it is the illegal product that is in the marketplace that is causing this problem.

I am from a Border county. We know people are buying from merchants in the North. Is that where all this illegal fuel is coming from?

That is exactly where it is coming from. We know from testing these products that they are high in sulphur and smoke. We have found they have a 60% to 85% failure rate. They are coming in and causing horrendous problems. It would be helpful to implement a voucher scheme in relation to PM2.5, which is particulate matter that is generated when solid fuel is burned and is a main component of smog. If we could regulate this sector and remove that, there would be savings of up to more than €200 million per year in terms of health benefits. As reported again last weekend, the local authority in Cork is having horrendous problems with smoky coal and wet timber, which are causing huge problems with air quality there.

I thank the witnesses. The final speaker is Deputy Aird.

This is the second time the witnesses have appeared before this committee and they have spoken to other committees as well. Will this problem go on for five years? Am I correct in saying it is not included in the programme for Government?

No, it is in it.

In that case, it behoves us as elected representatives to move this forward and not have the witnesses coming in here twice or three times a year for the next five years. If there is not an appetite to do it, even if it is in the programme for Government, we all know it will not be done. However, I will leave that aside for now.

What are the most immediate actions the Government can take to protect the households most at risk of energy poverty this winter?

If a message were to go out that we will have a strategy of using the waste, it would have an enormous impact. Immediately, we could start targeting those most in need with some sort of credit or tariff. When the universal energy credits were available a couple of years ago, arrears fell and the pressure reduced on families most in need. If we had a targeted credit immediately, using the waste, it would be a very good step and it would cost the Exchequer nothing.

How can social protection and housing policies be better aligned to address the need for both short-term relief and long-term energy affordability?

Interestingly, the clues to the answer to that question are in an excellent report by the previous membership of this committee, which included Deputy Wall. That report, published last June and referenced by Mr. Wyley-----

Does it relate to this issue?

Yes. It aligns almost verbatim with what is in the programme for Government but it goes a little deeper into how people get left behind, etc. I suggest looking again at that report. Its recommendations were sound two years ago and probably remain sound. The report dealt with the housing and social protection aspects together. It is a very useful document.

It is referenced in our submission and the committee, obviously, has access to it.

What role should community-based or local initiatives play in reducing energy poverty and how can they be supported nationally?

Communities are vital to this. The first step is to give people the policies and tools that will help them. Right now, for example, when a person running a community centres rings us asking for help, we cannot give that help. In addition, the use of local curtailed waste would be enormously beneficial. On remote wind farms in Mayo or Donegal, for instance, that waste energy cannot physically be moved to Dublin, Limerick or Cork. Using it locally would have a huge impact.

To what extent does energy poverty disproportionately affect people with disabilities and what targeted supports are in place, where needed, to protect those people?

Clúid and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, representatives of which we presented with at previous committee meetings, are very focused on this, including not just people with disabilities but also those with additional needs and persons living in supported accommodation.

I include all of them in my question.

They are the most vulnerable in an already vulnerable sector. In thinking about prioritisation, when we look at using the surplus to tackle inequalities and poverty, it can be very clearly marked that the priority must be those in the most need or with the largest arrears, those living alone or whatever categorisation the Department of Social Protection provides. The great thing is we are not asking to create a new database or a new set of rules. The Department already knows from its community welfare officers who is in most need. We are saying that is where we should start with targeting.

I take this opportunity to thank fuel merchants for the service they give to communities. Irrespective of what we say here today, and we talk all the time about renewable energy, there is a cohort of people who have an open fire or a solid-fuel cooker or stove. I like to see older people with a stove because it is safer. They were reared in an era when they and their parents went to the bog. Minsters have tried to stop the burning of turf but it did not work. One Minister stopped Bord na Móna from manufacturing briquettes and decided to allow it to bring them in from somewhere else. Where is the Minister who did that? I would like him to be here today to answer all these questions.

The time is up, Deputy.

The point I am making is that there is a whole cohort of people who were reared with a fire. Those people are not going anywhere. I see on my travels on public transport that every new house has no chimney. The next generation and the one after that will never know what it is to sit at a fire but for the people I am talking about, it is what they know. I do not want those people to be punished. I visit a lot of older people, as many of us here do. Walking into their maisonettes, the first thing one sees is the person sitting by the stove or cooker. I want that to continue and I want to support those people. I thank the fuel merchants for what they are doing for them.

I thank the witnesses for their contributions to our discussion on energy poverty and for providing their briefing material in advance. We will suspend briefly to facilitate the exchange of witnesses.

We are moving to No. 6 on our agenda, a discussion on energy poverty. It is a continuation of the discussion from this morning's meeting. We have representatives from Galway City Council and the National Economic and Social Council.

I will read a note on privilege and housekeeping matters before we begin. Witnesses are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity either by name or in such a way as make him, her or it identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that may be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction I might make.

Members attending remotely are reminded of the constitutional requirement that in order to participate in public meetings, they must be physically present within the confines of the Leinster House complex. This is due to the constitutional requirement that in order to participate in public meetings, members must be physically present within the confines or place where the Parliament has chosen to sit. In this regard, I ask any members participating via MS Teams to confirm they are on the grounds of the Leinster House complex if they wish to contribute to the meeting. I remind all those in attendance to make sure their mobile phones are switched off or on silent mode.

I thank everyone for attending today's meeting to discuss energy poverty and related matters. As a committee we look forward to engaging with the witnesses and gaining their insights into the ways and means we can alleviate energy costs for families and households while also contributing to greater energy efficiency and sustainability.

I welcome witnesses from the following organisations to the meeting. From Galway City Council, we have Ms Lyndsey Broxton O'Leary, climate action officer for climate change and sustainability, Mr. Derek Pender, director of servicers, project management and capital development, and Mr. Micheál Cormican, senior engineer, project management and capital development. From the National Economic and Social Council, I welcome Dr. Jeanne Moore, policy analyst, and Dr. Larry O'Connell, director.

I now invite Ms Broxton O'Leary from Galway City Council to make her opening remarks.

I thank the Chair and members of the committee for the invitation to appear before them today to discuss the NetZeroCities Pilot Cities project delivered by Galway City Council. I welcome the opportunity to share learnings from this EU-funded initiative and to reflect on its relevance for social protection, community development and the future delivery of climate action at local level.

Galway City Council is the only local authority in Ireland selected to participate in the EU NetZeroCities Pilot Cities Programme, which forms part of the European Union's mission on climate-neutral and smart cities. The programme supports cities to test and implement innovative approaches to rapid decarbonisation over a two-year period, with a strong emphasis on systemic change, citizen engagement and social inclusion.

The Galway project ran from June 2023 to May 2025 and focused on one of the most significant sources of emissions at city level, residential buildings, which account for over 40% of Galway city's total carbon emissions. This challenge is particularly acute in older urban neighbourhoods with high levels of energy poverty, reliance on fossil fuels for home heating and limited access to trusted retrofit advice.

The pilot was delivered within a designated decarbonisation zone in the Westside and Shantalla areas of Galway city, covering a population of approximately 7,000 people. Rather than focusing solely on technology, the project was designed to address the social, economic and institutional barriers that prevent households from retrofitting their homes, such as upfront cost, a lack of skilled contractors, complex grant processes and low levels of confidence or awareness among homeowners.

At the centre of the project was the establishment of a community-based one-stop-shop, known as the Warm Home Hub, located in the Westside Resource Centre and supported by a parallel online service, including a website and online appointment booking system. The hub provided independent, face-to-face guidance to households across the full retrofit journey, from initial assessment to grants and contractor engagement, placing trust, accessibility and social inclusion at the heart of climate action delivery.

In total, the Warm Home Hub engaged with over 450 residents living in the Westside community through a wide range of outreach activities and consultations. Residents were offered step-by-step, free-of-charge advice on customised solutions for upgrading individual homes and were supported to understand how energy improvements can yield returns in the short and medium term through improved heating, home comfort, bill reductions and environmental sustainability.

A key part of the hub's work has been simplifying a complex retrofit landscape. The service provided clear information on available grant supports, helping households navigate eligibility and application processes so that upgrades became more accessible. The hub also provided residents with information on local contractors to support households in progressing their retrofitting journey with trusted local capacity.

In addition, the hub provided free building energy ratings, BERs, for residents of the Galway city decarbonisation zone, giving households an opportunity to better understand how energy was being used in their homes and what upgrade options would be most suitable. Alongside one-to-one support, a large number of community information and education events were organised, including workshops, information sessions, drop-in clinics, family events and training events, ensuring that engagement was inclusive and accessible to different household needs.

To strengthen wider awareness and participation, the project also developed a dedicated website with information on Warm Home Hub services, the NetZeroCities programme in Galway city, upcoming events and practical articles on retrofitting, alongside staff contact details. The hub further supported the organisation of high-profile engagement and training initiatives, including the display of the Mount Lucas mobile retrofit training unit in Galway city, complemented by drop-in clinics and training opportunities. The project also participated in local promotional campaigns, including a number of media interviews with Galway Bay FM, helping to broaden awareness of the supports available.

Alongside direct household support, Galway City Council also piloted a retrofit accelerator programme, working with education and training providers to identify skills gaps, improve existing courses and incentivise workers to enter retrofit-related trades. This element is particularly relevant to the committee's remit, as it demonstrates how climate action can support local employment, skills development and just transition objectives when aligned with community need.

A further innovation of the project was the establishment of a quadruple helix steering group, bringing together local government, community organisations, academia and industry. This group was tasked with identifying structural barriers in the policy, financial and administrative areas and developing recommendations that extend beyond the lifetime of the pilot.

This governance model has proven critical in moving from isolated projects towards transferable, scalable approaches to climate action at local and regional level. Importantly, the NetZeroCities pilot was delivered on time and within budget, and its learnings are now embedded in Galway City Council’s Climate Action Plan 2024–2029. The project has also contributed to national and European learning through twinning and knowledge sharing with other cities, reinforcing the role of Irish local authorities as test beds for innovation under EU climate missions.

In closing, the key message from Galway’s NetZeroCities experience is that climate action is most effective when it is local, community led and socially informed. Addressing emissions from homes is not just an environmental challenge; it is a social protection issue, a public health issue and a community development opportunity. The pilot has shown that with the right structures, supports and governance, local authorities can deliver climate solutions that are fair, inclusive and capable of being scaled nationally. I look forward to engaging with the committee on how this learning can inform future policy, funding mechanisms and supports for communities across Ireland.

I thank Ms Broxton O'Leary. I now invite the National Economic and Social Council representative, Dr. Jeanne Moore, to make her opening remarks.

Dr. Larry O’Connell and I are attending here as members of the secretariat of the National Economic and Social Council, NESC. We would like to thank the Chairperson and members of the committee for this invitation. Our opening statement sets out the formal role of NESC. Today we are going to focus on recommendations from the council report Connecting People to the Energy Transition, a secretariat paper on energy communities in Ireland and one on energy poverty, all conducted as part of a wider energy programme of work.

Ireland is undertaking a monumental transformation of its energy system, moving from a reliance on imported fossil fuels to a decentralised system based largely on renewables to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. While this is a profound technical and economic undertaking, it is also a societal challenge. The council's work and this particular report argue that if this transition is going to succeed, it must be just, inclusive and fair and improve well-being. Its latest report on connecting people argues that we must place people at the core of the transition so that the ask for the energy transition is clearer. The benefits and opportunities as well as the costs should be shared. Without that, we run the risk of eroding the public trust necessary for a stable and secure future. A just transition approach ensures that the process and the outcomes of the energy transition are equitable, protecting those most at risk while building resilience across society.

At the heart of this concern is energy poverty. As we know, it is a complex state where households are unable to keep their house adequately warm due to a combination of low income, poor building efficiency and high energy costs. Our evidence shows that vulnerability to energy poverty is not uniform. Those at the highest risk include lone-parent households, people with disabilities, older people living alone and tenants in the private rented sector. Alarmingly, as many as 2,800 excess winter deaths in Ireland have been associated with energy poverty, primarily in the over-65s age group. Of further concern is the proportion of utility bills in arrears, particularly in electricity and gas. In electricity it was 13% in 2024, while domestic gas arrears reached 25% in early 2025.

To address this, the council makes several critical recommendations. We must develop clear pathways to end energy poverty as a key outcome of this transition. We need to address the split incentive in the private rented sector, where neither landlord nor tenant has the incentive to upgrade. The council recommends introducing minimum BER standards for the rental sector while ensuring robust protections for tenants against evictions or unfair rent hikes following upgrades. Currently, the fuel allowance is an income support, not a climate measure, as it does not consider fuel type. We recommend reviewing how such supports can better facilitate a transition away from fossil fuels to renewable energy. We should also explore an energy guarantee or targeted energy credits to provide essential energy at an affordable cost for the most vulnerable.

Residential buildings contribute nearly one tenth of Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions and to meet our legally binding targets, we must rapidly scale the replacement of fossil-fuel heating with low-carbon alternatives. Ireland has ambitious targets of retrofitting 500,000 homes to a B2 standard and installing 400,000 heat pumps by 2030. However, we know the energy efficiency gap remains a hurdle. From Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, research we know that about one quarter of homeowners were considering retrofits but more than half were not. The barriers are not just financial; they are technical, practical and perceptual, but cost remains the dominant issue, cited by over 61% of those surveyed in that work.

Our recommendations for scaling these efforts are around providing information, but not just doing that alone. It rarely challenges behaviour. We need to use trusted messengers and local energy champions. People who are known within their communities are vital to help households navigate complex grant applications. District heating is a proven solution for densely populated areas, yet it accounts for less than 1% of the Irish market. We need a plan-led approach to identify zones suitable for district heating and accelerated deployment to ensure low-income urban households are not left behind.

There is also an urgent need for greater clarity regarding the phasing-out of fossil-fuel boilers to give households certainty in their long-term investments, but we must also recognise that decarbonising heat is a cultural challenge. Participating in research on the cultural role of the fireplace and the hearth can help create policies that resonate with the public’s lived experience.

A place-based approach is essential for building local energy resilience and the ability to withstand and recover from disruptions like those seen during Storm Éowyn in early 2025. Recent extreme weather has highlighted that transitioning to clean energy without considering resilience leaves people vulnerable, particularly in rural areas. Communities in Ireland and across Europe are trying to do something about energy where they live. Energy communities and sustainable energy communities are key to a place-based strategy. Ireland has a strong network of over 1,200 sustainable energy communities registered with the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, but only an estimated 3% of these are active renewable energy communities engaged in energy generation projects. Where they can, energy communities are proving they can be key local energy actors by delivering on energy efficiency, energy generation and sharing energy knowledge. They are offering advisory supports for those in energy poverty and bringing local energy and cost savings to communities.

Energy communities are engaging with households living in disadvantaged communities. For example, the Wexford town sustainable energy community collaborated with the local authority and others to support a local energy champion in Southend. Energy communities are supporting households who want to retrofit their homes in Dunleer, County Louth. A sustainable energy community and a social enterprise, Energy Team, have successfully upgraded 450 homes, bringing increased comfort, energy efficiency and energy savings. Other communities are seeking to generate renewable electricity, bringing local economic value.

However, these groups face significant barriers, including volunteer burnout, prohibitive grid connection costs and a lack of early-stage funding. Local place-based action can increase energy generation and build energy resilience. To unlock their full potential, the council recommends that barriers be removed, including moving beyond the 100% community-owned requirement for certain supports. We recommend supporting co-ownership and shared equity models, with communities partnering with developers or local authorities. Action is also needed to ensure renewable energy communities can access development funding. There is a policy foundation in place for these energy community groups providing advisory and ground supports through the SEAI to help them learn, plan and do, and supports from the Department of Climate, Energy and Environment through the small-scale renewable electricity support scheme. We explore other means of supporting them through crowdfunding, public share offers and green bonds as alternative capital sources.

Local energy resilience can be strengthened by enabling the use of electric vehicles and solar PV batteries at a community level. Seeing is believing, and funding demonstration projects can showcase the potential impact of communities working to generate renewable electricity, share energy and increase energy efficiency. We strongly support the introduction of energy sharing, allowing citizens to share self-generated energy so that households and energy communities will be able to do so more as we have seen in other European countries such as the virtual sharing of renewable electricity generated from, for example, solar panels between households, communities and others, whether they own the panels or not, including those in energy poverty.

We must address how we manage this transition. Strengthening energy connections requires public governance that is agile and people centred. We recommend establishing an inclusive energy forum that represents diverse households, young people and energy communities. This forum could help create a galvanising mission for Ireland - a shared vision that moves the narrative from a technocratic burden to a collective opportunity for better well-being, health and local prosperity.

We must also be honest about the long-term costs. We must set out a clear, long-term approach to how the substantial investment required will be shared fairly across society and not rely solely on consumer utility bills. This new energy system is not yet fully in view, but the possibilities are emerging. By acting collectively and ensuring that the transition is people centred, we can cultivate a unified vision that delivers tangible benefits to every household and community in Ireland. The energy transition should work for everyone.

I thank Dr. Moore for her presentation. We will now have questions from members. First up is Senator Rabbitte.

I thank the witnesses for taking the time to be here today. The invitation to attend was issued at short notice, to I appreciate their attending. Between both sessions today, we are getting a wide-ranging view of what is being done and of where there are shortfalls.

Ms Broxton O'Leary stated that the city council's project focused on the areas of Westside and Shantalla, which have a combined population of 7,000, and that it had interfaced with 450 people in Westside. How many of the 7,000 people who live in these areas engaged with the overall project?

The 450 represents the number of people who were involved with the one-stop shop and who sought one-to-one advice. It takes longer to figure out how many people chose to retrofit. The project lasted 18 months to two years. Anyone who started on the retrofit scale would have been at different levels of the retrofit process, for example, where they were considering whether to proceed or whatever. It was over 450 people in the Westside area.

No matter how small a step that people made in engaging, did all households participate? BER ratings were supplied free of charge.

Yes.

How many households went as far as getting their BER rating or understanding where they were in terms of their energy efficiency?

One hundred people got BERs through the project and the one-stop shop - the Warm Home Hub. If the Senator is asking how many of them went from getting a BER to retrofitting their homes, it would be hard to give a figure at the moment. As I said, it is a process. Over 450 people did engage at some level with the Warm Home Hub and 100 got free BERs.

This was part of an EU programme.

Yes.

How much funding did the city council get to deliver the programme?

There was €1 million in EU funding.

Was that money for engagement and for staffing the hub?

The funding was used for four work packages, namely the community one-stop shop, project management, upgrading training programmes and the steering group. The funding was spread evenly across those four work packages and was used by the different agencies that were involved in the project.

Ms Broxton O'Leary referred to training. We all know that there is a shortage of tradespeople.

Yes.

I have no doubt that Dr. Moore would have said exactly the same thing, namely that there is a need to provide training. Aside from finance, the next greatest barrier is getting somebody to do the work. Did the city council work with the ETB or who did it work with? How did it attract people and get them trained up?

As part of work package 3, the HEA and the University of Galway were involved. We worked with those partners on looking at the training that was available, upgrading it to contemplate retrofitting and making it more accessible for people to do the training. Online training is also available, and nearly zero energy building, NZEB, training is a really important part of it. We had a two-day retrofit training hub in Galway at which staff from the Mount Lucas campus provided training.

Both Ms Broxton O'Leary and Dr. Moore mentioned how community groups have tried to do things themselves. Ms Broxton O'Leary referred to the collective approach involving the city council and the partners in education. Reference was also made to different elements of technology and to the SEAI. Is that the model the witnesses would like to see? Is it the model that we should be focusing on in order to get more delivery in communities?

Southend is another great example of collaboration getting started. It involved the energy community working with the local authority, Sláintecare and, I think, the local university. They came up with a simple plan in the context of supporting a family resource worker to spend two hours a week with people in a disadvantaged area and help them apply for funding for the warmer homes scheme. The people involved were eligible for that scheme but none of them had applied because they felt that filling in the forms would be complicated. That joined-up thinking recognised that there was a need, and local people got through a lot of the barriers simply by sitting down and talking to a trusted messenger and intermediary. Sometimes it is about connecting what is already there. Everybody was trying to tackle energy poverty and increase retrofitting. Sometimes, however, it is the simpler communication in a social context that works. People who are considering whether to undertake retrofitting are often not sure and feel there is so much uncertainty involved that they maybe will choose not to retrofit. It is about reassurance. We feel that there is a real need for energy champions. I have met people who are part of very knowledgeable energy communities. There are people who are being trained and supported through the SEAI, which provides a lot of great training. These people could be supported to be a really useful part of a local energy development process that would involve communities in retrofitting, energy efficiency and other areas.

I thank the witnesses for coming in. On 23 January 2025, the programme for Government was published. It contained a commitment to "Explore if legislation could be enacted to divert surplus renewable energy, that would otherwise be wasted, to homes in fuel poverty" and another to "Explore ways to use surplus renewable energy to help reduce energy poverty, ensuring that renewable energy benefits all communities". Earlier, representatives of EnergyCloud Ireland told the committee that €523 million is wasted every year on surplus renewable energy.

The main barrier to people retrofitting their homes relates to upfront costs. A lot of the people that I deal with would not have the money to cover such costs. I know they can try to claim that money back. That is a big barrier to people retrofitting their homes. Did the two-year project mostly involve local authority housing or was it private houses? On the funding of €1 million, am I right in saying that no work was done on the houses involved and that it was just the case that advice was offered? If you are retrofitting homes, €1 million would not go too far.

Cost is the biggest barrier. There is the decarbonisation zone in Galway city where a lot of elderly people live. Some of those people may be socially disadvantaged.

If they are being provided with grant aid of potentially 50% for what is going to be a €40,000 deep retrofit of their property, they will be of the view that have more important things to do, including putting food on the table every week. We talk about the just transition and bringing people on this journey. Ultimately, in order to bring these people with us, we need somebody with deep pockets to incentivise them. We can speak to them, educate them, do all the press releases and identify how their energy bills will decrease over time, but there is still an upfront cost. While some financial institutions are giving lower rates in respect of loans for retrofitting purposes, the people to whom I refer are of the view that they have far more important things to do with what little disposable income they may have. That is the biggest barrier we find in bringing people with us.

The people whose houses need to be retrofitted are mostly vulnerable people, older people and single parents.

Yes. Without a doubt, the people who need it the most are the ones who probably cannot afford it.

It is very hard to see that there will be a very strong take-up unless the grants are 100%. They would want to be very close to 100% for a lot of the people who need them, namely those who are going to change this around. The people struggling the most are not going to be able to come up with €10,000 or €15,000. It is a non-runner for them unless the grants are 100% or very close to it.

I concur with that.

Does Dr. Moore want to comment?

I will respond to the first part of the Deputy's question. I was not lucky enough to hear Mr. Wyley and Mr. Lee from EnergyCloud, but I have heard them speak before. Actually, we cite their example in our work. It is a very innovative approach. It recognises something that is perhaps not as obvious in today's world, which is that we have devices at home that are smart. We have energy assets. The hot water we have is an asset. When we are going to have heat pumps and batteries, we are going to be able to use them to store energy. If we can do that in a way that is being resourced and paid for by excess energy that would have been wasted, then that is, in a sense, a real benefit for people who are in energy poverty. We have seen the way the EnergyCloud model has worked. We would be very supportive of those innovative solutions. There are probably others. They recognise, for example, that, in time, people will have batteries that will be able to be switched on and off remotely, which could save them money. Those can be co-ordinated. A lot of interesting research is looking at how this could be a tool to respond to energy poverty.

Part of it is behavioural. An example is learning that you might do a lot of batch cooking and that you might not always cook your dinner between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.; you might do it a bit earlier or later. It is a like how we use our washing machines. We know we try not to do the washing at peak times, often because we are being incentivised to do that. If the incentives were increased with dynamic pricing, whereby we would be using real-time data from our smart meters, which we have not yet really been enabled to do, that could really help us to make energy savings. Lots of things are coming. It is about joining up the dots. We would be supportive of that.

I thank Dr. Moore very much and call Deputy O'Reilly.

I thank our witnesses. I am sorry because I missed the first few minutes of the meeting, but I did get a chance to read over the submissions. I have a few questions. The first relates to our witnesses from Galway. It was stated that the population covered was 7,000 and that 450 came forward. Was that in line with expectations? It was 6.5% of eligible people who engaged. I am genuinely not sure if that would be considered a high or a low level of engagement. How were the 450 broken down?

When we talk about the 450, it is important to remember that the project lasted two years and the one-stop shop had a number of staff in it. We can relate that to the number of outreaches they could do. All of the 450 people who were there would have come in for appointments, but some of them would have been part of door-to-door campaigns in the context of trying to bring people in and things like that. The number of people reached was relative to the number of people working in the area involved.

I was just trying to get my head around that. The other question relates to what the situation would have been if more people had been working there. Does Ms Broxton O'Leary feel that there was more of a need there and that there would have been more take-up?

Yes. Any of the community events we did were always well attended and there was always a good interest, so that would probably have been the case.

In terms of the make-up of the 450 people who engaged, the trends and the data I have seen tend to indicate that it is more likely to be households that are not struggling with energy costs that will come forward.

Yes.

Many people who are middle class or in higher income brackets are availing of this, while there are poorer people who might not engage. Was that the case? If it was the case, what is the best way to address it?

It was the case, and this relates to the question Mr. Pender answered earlier. A certain investment is required when households are retrofitting. Some people over the age of 65 were also coming in for appointments. They might have been entitled to 100% funding but were not aware of that. I suppose it relates to household income and, as Mr. Pender said, to what is important to people at the time, namely whether to retrofit their home or put food on the table.

Yes, and many households are having to face that very stark reality, despite what Ministers might like to tell us. It is regrettable, I suppose, for those households that this is not at the top of the list of what is important, but I completely understand why. If you do not know what you are going to eat tonight or are hungry, it is very hard to think about whether there is a draught coming down your chimney. I completely get that. I do not mean this in a critical way, but I am just wondering, as a lesson learned from that project, whether there are any ideas about how to engage more with the communities to which I refer? I would say that any retrofitting should start with the coldest homes first. Those are likely to be the ones with people who are on low incomes. Specifically, when we look at poverty statistics, households that have a person with a disability, lone-person households with teenagers and so on are more likely to be cold. Is there any way we can target those homes? I appreciate that there is an upfront investment under the scheme, but for those people who are not in social housing, what would be the best way to engage them?

That is a very good question. One way we spoke about doing it at the time was to perhaps identify eight to 12 properties, do a full, deep retrofit of them for residents and then invite the community in to see what the benefits could be, including reduced energy bills.

They would be like ambassadors for it.

While it might not go all the way in terms of convincing people, they might at least be able to say that in a year's time, if they were to get on their feet a bit better, it might be something they could achieve themselves. It would be about doing those eight to 12 properties in the decarbonisation zone and showing what the benefits could be in terms of reduced energy consumption and lower energy bills.

Yes. I thank Mr. Pender.

One hundred free BERs were provided. Even providing those to households lets them see what level they are at. As Mr. Pender said, it gives an insight into how achievable it might be for them to be able to get from an F rating up to a B and so on. Information is really key.

Excellent. I thank Ms Broxton O'Leary.

Dr. Moore referred to the need for an energy guarantee, perhaps specifically for low-income households. We all know that the likelihood of being on a prepay meter is greatly increased by the fact of being a lower income household. Some local authorities are putting these meters in as a matter of course. Regarding the energy guarantee, I have a concern - and I have expressed it here at the committee and on the floor of the Dáil several times - in relation to what I refer to as "micro-disconnections". The latter relate to people who do not have enough money to put in their prepay meters and who find themselves effectively cut off, even though the energy providers will state that nobody gets disconnected. If people do not have any electricity coming into the house because they do not have the money, they are effectively disconnected. The process of accessing community welfare is too long for this type of situation; it needs to be much snappier. In terms of the energy guarantee, how would this be seen as working in conjunction with prepay meters?

That is a good question. We did not specifically get into the mechanisms through which an energy guarantee would work in an Irish context because what we were really examining were proposals from Age Action and the Vincentian MESL Research Centre that looked into the energy guarantee as an idea.

What we recommended was that it should be reviewed alongside social tariffs and social block tariffs. These are all mechanisms used in other countries, such as Belgium where there are regulated price measures for particularly vulnerable groups. There are discounts and vouchers specifically for those groups. The energy guarantee is a targeted measure designed to ensure essential energy remains affordable for the most vulnerable groups. It is very important that it is tailored to an Irish context and that which approach would work best be reviewed. What the council recommends is that they should be reviewed and that these alternative mechanisms that target the most vulnerable should be really looked into and further developed.

These are measures that would target the most vulnerable, providing them with the cheapest and most cost-effective form of energy. Those on prepaid meters pay the highest rate, which does not make any sense.

It is great to have the Galway jersey team with us and they are most welcome. I am sorry that I missed the opening presentations but I have a flavour of what was said. I compliment and congratulate the witnesses on this initiative. It is the first in the country and it is great that we have a template that we could implement at national level.

I listened with interest when people spoke about the most vulnerable. Sometimes the most vulnerable are those who resist change the most. I have seen this over the years, where a retrofit is suggested or recommended. I was a member of the local council and I was on the coalface trying to encourage or cajole people into moving in this direction. Something that happens as part of a retrofit, as we appreciate, is that a solid fuel stove has to go. This is the number one thing that people do not want to happen. It is out of fear and a sense of people wondering what they will do when it is gone. There is the fear of the hike in electricity costs and it easy to understand this. With the best will in the world, it is not an easy task to convince people to buy into the scheme. It takes quite a bit of empathy when first visiting a household. How did the witnesses manage this part of it? I have an interest in understanding how they got buy-in. What made people feel it is something they could embrace?

Convincing people sitting on the fence to change comes back to Mr. Pender's point on needing data. Pilot schemes can monitor the data and show the improvements and over time, and the payback if there is going to be an investment. Those aged over 65 can get the full cost of a retrofit but the means test means those who are not in social housing and cannot afford it will have to get bridging finance. They are the target group. The people who can afford it are doing it and they can see the payback over a number of years. It is about being able to prove to those who are sceptical or sitting on the fence, and who do not want to get rid of the stove, the payback from putting in a heat pump, doing a deep retrofit and doing insulation works. The pilot that Mr. Pender mentioned is something that should be done throughout the country so that it is a template.

This is not a trick question. If I were to visit the estate and do my own survey on what the benefits are to the households and what they think about it overall, what are people likely to say? Reference has been made to the increase in electricity bills. The reason I ask is that I am aware of a small number of rural houses done under the retrofit scheme and the one thing they all speak about is the hike in electricity prices.

This is a very important question. Part of our conversation needs to be about health. Research shows that respiratory illnesses can be much higher among vulnerable older people with solid fuel heating. The benefits to well-being of living without fossil fuel in the home, and living in a clean home with an electric heat pump that is warm, is, perhaps, something we have not explored enough in Ireland. I agree that cost, and managing that cost, is a very important part of it but the benefits are that we would have more reassurance of not having to worry about air pollution or a carbon monoxide alarm. This is something we have not really explored.

We must also recognise that the fireplace is a key cultural part of Ireland. We really need to have a discussion about what it means to have a low-energy future for our homes and what it looks like. We need demonstration projects so that people can see and visit houses. For example, in Maynooth there is a demonstration energy-efficient house that people can visit. Going into one and seeing how it works and speaking to people who live there can really help to reassure. Other countries switching to heat pumps have invested a lot in this conversation and awareness. It is not only about communication but really talking to people about the benefits. This is perhaps something we have not done enough. The SEAI behavioural team has begun to bring some of these social and behavioural insights to the fore, trying to understand some of the psychological barriers as well as the financial barriers.

I do not have any more questions but I want to tell Mr. Pender that I always knew he would make it to the top.

Many of my questions have been covered. It was said that the scheme was delivered on time and within budget and now the lessons are being embedded in Galway City Council. What are the lessons? The committee has heard from EnergyCloud and Deputy Guirke mentioned it earlier. It sounds too good to be true. Did the witnesses know about EnergyCloud before they started? Did they consider working with it on the project?

The main lesson for us is that community engagement is a big part of it. Giving people free independent advice on retrofitting is something that worked very well. All of the community events were well attended. People are willing to get the information and arm themselves to do what they have to do when it comes to retrofit if they can. One of the main lessons for us is that community engagement is important. Having boots on the ground going out and giving information is important, rather than just having newspaper and radio advertisements. A one-to-one personable approach with people getting one-to-one tailored advice for their own homes is important. Everyone is different and everyone has different houses. This is the response to the first part of the question. I apologise, but what was the second part of the question?

Was teaming up with EnergyCloud considered? It does not seem to cost any money.

I only took over the project late in the day and I do not know. I cannot answer the question. I can look into it to see if it is something that was considered. I would imagine that if it was, it might not have suited the project overall. I will check it out.

In one sense, the lessons our colleagues in Galway are speaking about are those we are trying to draw out at a national level with regard to simplifying the process, trusted advisers and the local government structure. I had not previously heard the phrase "quadruple helix" but this is exactly what we need nationally, with the involvement of local authorities, communities and academics. What is often a failing in policy here is that we have really good pilots but we fail to learn at the centre.

Dr. Moore was talking to some of the colleagues on the project – there are others – but the really important thing now is to take the lessons and understand them nationally. That is what we need to do in other areas.

Most of my questions were asked at the previous meeting.

Did the pilot project start with the older houses? I was a member of a local authority for many years and saw that we had many very old houses, most of which were purchased down through the years by the tenants. There are still a few. I presume these are the ones in question, because these had no insulation in their roofs or anything else. Most of the houses were built back in the Marian year and some before that. People were still living in them and paying rent to the local authorities. I presume the witnesses started with those houses first.

That was part of the decarbonisation zone. There was a completely separate budget within housing maintenance for retrofitting the social homes. That would be predominantly a social housing area. As the Deputy said, a lot of the houses were purchased through tenant purchase over the years. It has become a case of mixed tenure. There is a separate programme for doing the social homes under our housing maintenance teams.

Is that seen as very successful?

Yes, it is critical. If we are going to be leading and trying to deliver on the climate action plan, we need to make sure our homes are being retrofitted to a standard that ensures the comfort of the tenants. It is important that we, as a local authority, are not trying to advocate private sector retrofitting of the houses but actually doing it ourselves. We are practising what we preach.

We were talking to EnergyCloud representatives earlier and they had some very good ideas. Was there any joined-up thinking involving them?

I am unaware of it. We will have to come back to the Deputy on that because I am not sure.

No matter what happens, does the stove have to go? I have been involved in thousands of cases where people got grants and in all cases they had to take out the bath to put in a walk-in shower. I agreed with that 100% because, as people get older, the most dangerous thing in a house is the bath. I did not have a problem with it. Is the stove the red line? Must it go?

We are in a transition. We are trying to move towards clean energy and renewable sources, of which we will have plenty. It is about working with people to see the pathway forward. Heat pumps are a fantastic technology. People probably are not as familiar with them as they are with solid fuels.

There are options whereby you could have a scale according to which you would be ultimately moving towards a clean energy house relying on electricity, but people are very vulnerable in this regard. The SEAI is expert at considering the tailoring urban-area solutions for rural areas. I would not put things as emotively as the Deputy did because we are all on a journey together away from fossil fuels. We also know the health benefits of moving towards cleaner sources.

Mr. Pender would have been visiting some of the people I am talking about. What was the reaction when he said they could not have a fire?

I did not visit them personally.

I am sure he did not.

I want to refer to an important topic the Deputy raised on the types of houses that need deep retrofitting, namely those built in the 1960s and 1970s. Mr. Cormican alluded to the programme of works that the local authority has.

We are all moving towards a target of having our carbon emissions reduced by 51% by 2030. As a local authority, which accounts for only 1% of the carbon emissions in the entire city, we will achieve that purely because public lighting has been retrofitted to LED, hydrotreated vegetable oil is being used instead of diesel in our larger fleet, and our smaller fleet has been electrified.

Although we will meet our 2030 retrofitting targets, we will struggle enormously to meet the 2050 targets. The reason is that we receive funding every year to retrofit approximately 50 to 60 homes. To meet our targets, we need to be retrofitting 500 to 600 per annum. There is a significant shortfall and gap that will have to be narrowed somehow. The only way to narrow it is through human and financial resources.

I have a final question. I want to go back to the issue of stoves again because I deal with many senior people in my community. If we have a situation like Storm Éowyn and everything is blacked out, what do we say to those people if they have no stoves? What emergency provision is there in this regard?

When we were writing the report and connecting people to the energy transition, Storm Éowyn happened. It really made me realise resilience is something we are really going to have to think about as a country as we adapt to climate change. We are seeing climate change, extreme weather events and unprecedented impacts, such as power outages across the country, so we are going to have to work with communities to build local energy resilience. That should be locally based and guided nationally.

We have highlighted the role of community hubs. Energy communities can play a part. We must work with communities so they can plan ahead and know what steps to take to support the most vulnerable during power outages. There may be local batteries they can access. Maybe they will know better how to access electric vehicle batteries. If a community has photovoltaic solar, batteries may be usable. There are ways in which communities can become more resilient in the face of power outages. This is the journey we are on, and other countries are having these discussions as well. We should be more resilient. We should be able to use some of the really interesting low-carbon solutions to increase resilience, not reduce it.

I thank the witnesses.

I am not a member of the committee, so I really appreciate the opportunity to participate in the debate. I welcome everyone, particularly the officials from Galway City Council.

It is great to have an opportunity to discuss issues relative to things in whose development I had a part to play. I was a member of the city council when we were debating and developing the decarbonisation plan and the climate action plan for the city. One thing I lament is that the Warm Home Hub is no longer in existence. It is referred to in the opening statement as a significant tool in implementing the ambition of the decarbonisation zone and climate action plan. Are there any plans to replace it? I am thinking in particular about the staff who worked there, whom I came to know. I was able to refer people to them when they queried me on retrofitting their homes, be they local authority homes or private homes. The staff were also in a position to help people who did not reside in the decarbonisation zone. I do not know if the witnesses are aware of that. It was not the core remit of the staff but they did that willingly and very generously. Is there any way we can replace the warm home hub?

I thank the Deputy. It is good to see him. We, too, lament the loss of the Warm Home Hub. The funding concluded in May 2025. We advocated strongly for its continuance, which we achieved with funding from the Department, but unfortunately that funding expired in December. We are continuing to advocate. If the Deputy and his colleagues can help in any way, it would be appreciated. The loss of the hub is huge to the city council, Westside and the decarbonisation zone. The learnings from the Warm Home Hub can be applied everywhere. It was a one-stop shop for everybody and was very popular. We, too, strongly lament its demise.

We noted in the report the innovative work in decarbonisation zones around the country but that when examples were identified and work was going on, the funding did not continue.

It is something to think about if we are going to develop innovative schemes and projects and get things started in communities. It is about how we build on that and have a longer-term strategy to make sure we are not having one-off schemes. It is clearly working and was doing valuable work. How do we scale that up? It is a national strategic discussion about how we go from these innovative practices we are saying we want. We are putting a lot into the effort to get a decarbonisation zone in place, through all the paperwork and bureaucracy to have these innovative projects. How do we do that on a national scale so as not to lose that innovation?

Has Dr. Moore any suggestions as to how we can make sure we do not lose it and spread the word about it to inform more local authorities as to the success of it?

I noticed with the energy communities I met and had some online discussions with, that at the end of it the key question was if they could have each other's contact details. What we are learning is happening in the Aran Islands, or Dunleer, County Louth, or Galway is not something we are aware of. There is an important networking thing about sharing good practice. It is also about trusting our innovative capacity to dig up projects and make them happen. This is something energy communities wanted as well. They wanted demonstration projects. They have these innovative things going on, but they want the funding to scale that up to showcase what they can do. It is about trusting when we have found innovative projects. With Burren Life we discovered a great scheme in agriculture. That has been scaled up but it took a lot of effort to get that to European level and scale it up. It is about recognising when we have important innovations to network that information, build that up and tap into it, not to reinvent the wheel another time but to build on that.

That is an excellent point. The Deputy will be aware that every local authority was obliged to draft a climate action plan. Within the climate action plan every local authority was obliged to identify a decarbonisation zone. There are 30-odd decarbonisation zones around the country with different lessons. Not one shoe fits all. What we were doing in Westside was not being replicated in Clare, which was not being replicated in Limerick. There are so many lessons out there, that it needs to be all brought together under one roof.

A disappointing thing is that my recollection of the decarbonisation plan was that it extends to 2030. We are in 2026 and one of the central features we had in the Westside area was the Warm Home Hub. It is difficult outside of that. I recognise the work that has been done in retrofitting public buildings. The community centre in Westside was retrofitted and it has solar panels. Other municipal buildings might have benefited equally. I also recognise the enhancement of public lighting in the community. However, the greatest ambition in the decarbonisation plan was in the retrofitting of homes. We had an ambition to retrofit approximately 170 social houses in that area. How many have been done in terms of that figure?

I will come back on the figure for the decarbonisation zone but we nearly have to look at it like a system. This pilot is one part of it. There is policy, finance and information. One part is not going to solve it. It needs backing from a policy and finance point of view, especially for the private sector retrofit programme. They are concentrating on the decarbonisation zone, but we have approximately 4,000 social units in Galway city. The figure given was 50 or 60 per year. It would need funding to be increased because it is something we can do out of our current expenditure. It is probably a central government funding question about if that can be increased because it can be exponentially expanded. They use the budgets up quickly.

The social housing stock for Galway City Council is approximately 4,000? Out of that, the ambition was to retrofit 170. How close to that 170 are they?

That was the decarbonisation programme.

I apologise. In terms of retrofitting that is happening, they council staff are saying between 50 and 60 per year. At that pace how long will it take to get it done? We are talking about decades really. The same as every other local authority, it is the case that if the funding is there, the work will progress? I would like to ask about the interaction that the council might have had with the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, CRU. That body is charged with somewhat regulating the energy providers, but it has another role. It should be working closely with the council. However, specifically in terms of the pilot project, did the council have any interaction with the CRU? Did they find it useful? Is there anything it can do in this space?

We did not have any engagement with the CRU at all. I will double-check, but I certainly never had a conversation with anyone, and I would have been there more or less from the start.

It is just that it has a role in regulating. Maybe I am coming at this from a somewhat different perspective. I look at somebody who lives in a cold house and might be on a prepay meter but does not have enough money to pay it. Effectively their electricity is cut off for maybe 12 hours, 16 hours or more. That will show up well because that is a reduction in the amount of energy used. As part of any project, specifically where you are involving households on a low income or at risk of poverty I would see the CRU having a role interrogating those facts. There needs to be some understanding that when people in poorer households reduce their energy consumption, they maybe do not want to reduce their energy consumption. It is sometimes because they are forced to reduce their energy consumption because they cannot afford their bills. That is where there needs to be a piece of work done. My next question relates to the Warm Home Hub. Why was it closed? Had it fulfilled its purpose? Could it be reopened? Do the witnesses think it should be reopened, and if it were to be reopened how quickly, could they get it back up and running?

The Warm Home Hub was closed because the funding for it expired. I assure the Deputy that if we were given the funding tomorrow morning, we would expedite its reopening. I cannot put it any more simply.

I thank Mr. Pender for that.

On that note, we are out of time. I thank Mr. Pender, Ms Broxton O'Leary, Mr. Cormican, Dr. Moore and Dr. O'Connell for attending. We have had an inside information morning on energy poverty. We had witnesses before the committee earlier as well. On behalf of all the members, I thank them for coming to showcase what they have done in their own areas to improve energy efficiency and energy poverty across the system.