State completes latest renewable energy auction, but at relatively high price
The State has completed the fourth auction under the Renewable Energy Support Scheme (RESS 4).
The process saw more than 2GWh of capacity provisionally procured, enough to power up to half a million homes.
Four wind farms will provide 1,146 GWh of that total, coupled with solar projects that will generate 925GWh.
The average weighted bid price was €96.85 per MWh, which is lower than both the RESS 2 and RESS 3 auctions.
The average wind price was €90.47 per MWh while the average price for solar was €104.76 per MWh.
But according to switching website Bonkers.ie, those prices are not particularly cheap and they are partly index linked to inflation so will rise over the coming years.
“In 2020, before the energy crisis kicked off, the average price of electricity on the Irish wholesale market was around €40 per MWh,” said Daragh Cassidy, head of communications with Bonkers.
“The average wholesale price so far this year is just under €100.”
“So these auctions have come in pretty much at today’s still elevated prices.”
The development will boost Ireland’s renewable energy capacity by over 20%, with wind accounting for 55% of the volume in GWh terms.
Under the RESS system, support is only provided to renewable generators when market prices are low.
Generators must repay money to electricity customers when market prices are high, providing significant consumer protection, the Department of Environment, Climate Action and Communications said.
“Accelerating delivery of renewable energy will help to protect Irish households and businesses from high fossil fuel prices,” said Minister for the Environment, Eamon Ryan.
“To ensure that prices for Irish households and businesses continue to fall in future RESS auctions, we need a stronger pipeline of onshore wind and solar energy projects coming through our planning system and connecting to our grid.”
“The provisional results of the fourth onshore Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS) auction will help maximise the volume of renewables connecting to the electricity grid at the lowest cost to the consumer has proven to be a success.”
Although RESS 4 saw the volume of wind projects taking part increase, the number of wind projects remains relatively low primarily due to planning bottlenecks and judicial reviews being initiated against projects.
“Renewable energy projects must have planning permission in order to enter a RESS auction, which emphasises the need for planning applications for renewable energy projects to be quickly, but thoroughly assessed,” said Noel Cunniffe, chief executive of Wind Energy Ireland.
“This will help to ensure that projects looking to participate in future auctions will receive decisions on their planning applications in time to bid in the auction.”
“It is also critical to ensure that national efforts to speed up the delivery of renewable energy projects are not impeded by county councils across Ireland amending County Development Plans to block the development of new wind farms.”
Article Source – State completes latest renewable energy auction, but at relatively high price – RTE
