Paul Deane

Yesterday there was a story in the Irish Independent, Charlie Weston was writing about the Netherlands, where they have now stopped giving people, or will phase out paying people for electricity they sell back to the grid from their solar panels.

And the prediction is, according to an energy expert, Dr. Paul Deane, who's based, I think, at UCC, that they will eventually start doing that here too.

That the idea that you would generate your own power from your solar panels on the roof, any excess goes back into the, uh, grid, and you get paid for it.

Those days, those days are numbered, but there is a solution.

Now, over in the Netherlands, they are scrapping, uh, the energy credit system that they have for households from next year, and this is because of a huge increase in residential solar power that has created massive grid congestion.

Now, Paul Deane, he works in UCC.

He's an energy expert, and he's saying that the tariffs for exporting electricity to the grid from rooftop solar panels will eventually be phased out here in Ireland.

His comments come after seven electricity providers announced increases in the unit rate charged for the electricity they supply to homes, uh, but they failed to increase the so-called microgeneration credit rate they pay homeowners for selling energy back to them.

And so, the Irish Independent talks with an expert, uh, who happens to be a lecturer in Clean Energy Futures at University College Cork.

And so, Paul Deane believes we are going to follow suit here in Ireland, that our grid is also becoming congested, as there are nearly two hundred thousand microgeneration installations in the state.

That's a posh way of saying houses or businesses with solar panels.

I have a feeling they would really, really underestimate the backlash if that were to happen, because if you've been told you will get your credit, and you've invested your money on that basis, and then they change their minds- There's definitely going to be a lot of anger.

And so, the Irish Independent speaks with an energy expert, a professor from University College Cork, who believes the same could happen here.

So really, this story at the moment is one guy's opinion, but he is a rather learned person.

He's a lecturer in clean energy futures, and his name is Paul Deane.

So let's see if there's any prospect of this from a government point of view, and Fianna Fáil TD Tony McCormack is with us.

Now, I'm open to correction on that, but that's what I was told a number of years ago.

Well, energy expert Paul Deane of University, uh, College Cork said the tariffs for exporting electricity to the grid from, uh, rooftop solar panels will eventually be phased out in Ireland.

But I don't know how much that's worth.

Maybe someone out there, and I know there's a, a few people that are very keen on that side of things.