Debate contribution: Green Energy Transition

Debate contribution by Mr Andrew McMurray on 24 March 2025.

MLA

Mr Andrew McMurray

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

24 March 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Green Energy Transition

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4865273

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I welcome and support the motion. Growing our capacity to produce, store and distribute renewable energy is absolutely vital to our climate, environment and economy. It is alarming to see that the share of electricity consumption that comes from renewables has been steadily decreasing over the past few years. We should be well on our way to achieving the target of 80% by 2030; instead, we are regressing. We know that many of the key growth sectors of the future come with even higher energy demands. We must be able to support them. Renewable energy is not just a means to an end. The renewables sector can make a huge difference to our economy. RenewableNI estimates that as little as 1·5 gigawatts from the Northern Ireland offshore projects installed by 2032 could produce up to £2·4 billion in gross added value for Northern Ireland companies and produce employment up to the equivalent of 32,400 people working full-time for a whole year. Many of those would be highly skilled and well-paid jobs. The offshore sector could give a real boost to coastal communities in my constituency. Much of the work involved in offshore renewables will be centred around the smaller ports and harbours that host offshore maritime services, bases and storage facilities. We already have a healthy and innovative sector of small and medium-sized businesses in Kilkeel that could latch on to offshore projects off the South Down and Northern Ireland coast. It would be absolutely transformative for South Down. The planning system is rightly referenced in the motion. Major planning applications have a 30-week target, but applications for wind farms take, on average, three years to be processed. That is much too long, and there is not enough accountability for those timelines. Our neighbouring jurisdictions, as already referenced, handle it much better. We also need to reform planning policy so that renewable applications stand a chance. At the moment, decarbonisation is not given enough weight, and a revised —.

Yes.

I am not sure why that interjection came to me. I am not the Environment Minister, and I am sure that the Member could raise that by various means rather than interjecting. Anyway, we will carry on. Where did I get to? A revised strategy and policy statement (SPS) for renewables and low-carbon energy should have been published before Christmas to rectify that, yet, three months on, we are still waiting for it. Infrastructure is also a big issue for the grid and for storage. Every year, an increasing share of wind energy is lost because the infrastructure needed to store and distribute it efficiently is not there. The North/South interconnector is a key piece of infrastructure and is absolutely vital to achieving the 80 by '30 target, reducing energy waste and bringing down electricity prices. Eirgrid now estimates that it will not be completed until 2031, which is much too late. I understand that the main delays are rooted south of the border, so I urge the Minister to engage with her counterpart to ensure timely delivery on that essential piece of infrastructure.

514 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:13 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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