An MEP has said that the government could have chosen to allow farmers make a profit by selling electricity produced through solar installations on their farms to the national grid, but opted not to.
Fianna Fáil MEP Billy Kelleher recently submitted a question to European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development Janusz Wojciechowski on the new solar capital investment scheme under the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Scheme (TAMS).
This is funded through Pillar II of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which is itself funded through a combination of EU money and national co-funding. Pillar II is the rural development aspect of the CAP.
Under current rules, farmers who apply for grant aid under the scheme for solar PV installations on-farm cannot sell this back to the national grid.
In his question to the commissioner, Kelleher asked if this prohibition on selling back to the grid is an EU-mandated rule.
In his answer, Commissioner Wojciechowski indicated that there were a number of options available to member states in designing schemes, and that the option chosen by Ireland did not allow for farmers to sell electricity to the grid when produced by solar installations paid for by TAMS money.
Under Pillar II of CAP, member states can select from a number of measures and sub-measures, each coming with their own rules.
The commissioner told Kelleher that, under a measure chosen by Ireland, farmers “benefitting from support for agricultural activities…may produce on their farm energy for own use as an input in the agricultural production cycle, but not to sell to the grid as energy”.
“In case of over-production of energy, the surplus can be stored in batteries and re-used at a future date, or sent to the grid and withdrawn during the year up to the same amount when there is lack of energy,” Commissioner Wojciechowski added.
He went on to say that the Irish solar scheme under TAMS is funded under this measure, and thus energy produced through the scheme “can only be used for own consumption of the agricultural holding, as the Irish authorities have linked the scheme to the support of agricultural activities”.
However, several other measures were available to choose from that would have allowed surplus energy to be sold back to the grid, and which would have allowed the government to implement a state aid scheme to support that measure.
Under EU rules, state aid supports generally see less funding offered than schemes backed with EU money. State aid is exclusively funded through national exchequers.
Commissioner Wojciechowski said: “It is up to the member state to decide which measures of the RDP [Rural Development Programme] to activate.”
Commenting on the commissioner’s response to his question, Kelleher said: “We need to know why the [Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine] did not make the application under alternative measures. There may be very good reasons but they need to be in the public domain.
“All we have heard from the departmental spokespeople is that the prohibition is decided at EU level, and has nothing to do with Ireland. This is disingenuous at best,” he said.
The MEP added: “Farmers are rightly annoyed at a loss of potential income. To my mind, it makes no sense to have applied for EU funding in this fashion. The decision needs to be explained publicly and properly.”