Aontú leader and Meath West TD Peadar Tóibín has criticised the government for blaming farmers for climate change at the same time as planning permission being given to two more Amazon data centres in North Dublin.
Tóibín said: “Data centres accounted for 14% of all electricity demand in the state last year. Eirgrid estimates that this will rise to 29% by 2028.
“Only this week, permission was granted for two more data centres to be built in Dublin. This comes at a time when our national grid is in a seriously fragile position.
“Last week, over two days there were two separate amber [alerts]. This level of consumption is simply not sustainable. That the government is allowing this to happen is incredible,” he added.
An amber warning is issued by the Single Electricity Market Operator (SEMO), which is operated by EirGrid, in response to tight margins in the power system.
Although such an alert does not indicate a loss of supply to customers, it means that the buffer between the demand for electricity and the available supply is less than the optimum level.
EirGrid explained that the reasons for such a system alert are low wind, limited electricity imports and forced outages at a number of generators.
Taking a gamble on data centres
Tóibín claimed that by allowing what he described as “runaway consumption”, the government is taking a “dangerous gamble at a time when our fuel, gas and electricity situation is in a precarious position”.
He continued:
“It puts families trying to heat their homes at risk of power outages. Its illogical to allow one sector to have such a large portion of the electricity market in Ireland.
“That this is happening at the same time, the government continues to blame Irish farmers for climate change is incredible. It seems to be the case of ‘two data centres good, but four legs bad’.
“The government is punishing farmers by docking their income by up 21% and at the same time allowing major international businesses to radically increase energy consumption in Ireland,” he added.
Tóibín claimed that the ‘Amazon business model’ is wiping out much indigenous businesses.
“But it’s clear that there is one rule for their data centres in Ireland, and another for the family farmer,” he said.