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Energy Security

I will not, but I might later if I make better progress through the points that I want to make than I am at the moment. I mentioned renewables and the importance of ensuring diversity of supply. However, there is another important point that comes from renewables: if we do not address some of the technical factors of renewables, such as intermittency, we could exacerbate the problem of energy security rather than solve it. For example, I am not confident that we have the policies to build the back-up capacity that we will need if we are to have a greater contribution from intermittent renewables. The conclusion of a comparative study commission by National Grid and a number of other organisations stated:""While the Irish market is able to continually incentivise new peaking plant with increasing wind penetration, we are concerned that there is a real challenge in delivering very low load factor plant in the British market."" That needs to be addressed.