Not So Smart Metres
In the latest monthly commentary from Comhar on sustainability issues, guest commentator Professor Gerry Wrixon argues that lowering CO2 emissions in Ireland can be better achieved with the introduction of buy back schemes for microgenerators rather than installing smart meters.
By Professor Gerry Wrixon, former President of UCC
Guest Commentator for Comhar Sustainable Development Council
Ireland needs all the help it can get in order to reduce our CO2 emissions. According to Professor Richard Tol of the ESRI (Irish Times 28th August) when the final figures are in, it is expected that during 2007 we produced 73 million tonnes of CO2, 3.2 million tonnes more than we produced in 2006. This is 9 million tonnes above the target CO2 emissions the government has committed us to in 2012. We are consequently receding from our Kyoto target emission levels instead of approaching them.
There are many things we can do, and slowly are doing, such as better insulating our homes, driving lower emission cars etc. to cut down on our overwhelming dependence on imported fossil fuels and therefore reducing our CO2 production. Another potential contributor to our CO2 reduction strategy is the microgeneration of electricity. This is the production of electricity by consumers themselves, normally by either wind and/or solar (photovoltaic-PV) power. This electricity is then used directly by the consumer/producer with the surplus being delivered to the electricity grid. As the maximum output power of a microgenerator is generally far less than the consumer’s maximum electricity demand from the ESB network, the network does not have to be “strengthened”. This might need to be done for instance if a large power wind farm was placed in an area of low electricity demand.
In Ireland, theoretically at any rate, microgeneration is encouraged. On April 16th this year Energy Minister Eamon Ryan announced a pilot grant scheme to allow users to generate electricity for their own use and to sell excess power back to the grid. The ESB Networks website contains a section on “connecting a microgenerator” but states that “these generators may, at certain times, export electricity but currently no economically viable mechanism exists in Ireland to be paid for the electricity”.
This contrasts starkly with the situation in other EU countries where microgeneration is vigorously encouraged with electricity buy back rates that reflect the capital cost of the installation of a microgenerator in the first place. In Germany for instance (70% of whose area has the same annual solar power density as the South and East of Ireland), the buyback rate for solar generated electricity is €0.47/unit per unit of electricity (kWh).
Buy back rates at this level not only encourage the development of a sustainable microgeneration industrial sector but they demonstrate real commitment to achieving Kyoto targets.
The numbers for Ireland are revealing. Ten square meters of electricity producing PV panels on the south facing roof of a house roughly SE of a line from Dundalk to Kenmare will produce 2000 units of electricity (kWh) each year. This is what is produced at the coal burning power station at Moneypoint by burning 1.3 tonnes of coal with the consequent emission of 1.8 tonnes of CO2. A realistic electricity buy back tariff in Ireland would encourage people to invest in such PV microgenerators on their roofs, as has happened in Germany. If this happened in less than 280,000 such houses for instance, it would cut our national CO2 emissions by half a million tonnes annually, while reducing our coal imports by more than 360,000 tonnes. Such a scenario would not of course make us Kyoto compliant but it would be a significant positive step in the right direction.
Equally importantly, it would be a source for new sustainable jobs. Companies in the glass manufacturing sector, now suffering because of the construction downturn, could easily start up the manufacture of PV modules using, initially at any rate, imported cells. Power conditioning equipment needed to make this renewable electricity conform to ESB standards could be supplied by our power electronics industry and electricians could up-skill to install and connect these roof mounted systems. Similar considerations would apply to the creation of a wind microgenerator industrial sector. As well as satisfying domestic demand, such microgenerator products and skills could also be exported to a world ever more eager to adopt sustainable ways.
A realistic buy back tariff has been shown in many of our European neighbours to be the key factor in encouraging individual householders to invest in microgenerators. This has lead in Germany, Italy and Spain not only to a reduction of their CO2 emissions but to the creation of tens of thousands of sustainable jobs in this industry.
A buy back tariff could be implemented speedily and cost effectively in Ireland, were the political will to be present. For houses with microgenerators it would only take the installation of an additional inexpensive standard meter to measure the amount of electricity being exported to the electricity grid. This meter could then be read in the normal way by the ESB. The difference of course would be that the householder would get a cheque from the ESB for the value of the electricity exported to the grid.
Alas, this does not seem to be the route we have decided to follow in Ireland. Enter the “Smart Meter”, a costly and quite unnecessary complex piece of technology which it is planned to roll out, albeit on a trial basis at first. This will act as a net electricity meter, basically pricing exported microgenerated electricity equal to that of ESB generated electricity. Consequently the premium associated with microgeneration, and justified in other countries by progress towards Kyoto goals as well as growth of a new industrial sector, will be absent here in Ireland. This removes the incentive for householders to invest in microgeneration in the first place, effectively taking this attractive and progressive method of electricity generation off the table in Ireland. It would appear that the only rational for the introduction of Smart Meters at all is to discourage the proliferation of microgeneration.
Consideration should be given to cancelling the extremely expensive Smart Meter Program and investing the money in providing a realistic buy back tariff to encourage the growth of microgeneration in Ireland with its consequent economic and sustainable advantages as outlined.
25 years ago Ireland lost an opportunity to participate in the development of the wind turbine industry because of conservative policies that discouraged technical risk taking by the ESB. Given that we have one of the best wind regions in Europe and that the wind industry is now a multi billion Euro global giant employing hundreds of thousands of people worldwide, our timidity and conservative decision taking has in retrospect cost us dearly in terms developing a wind energy sector in our economy. This could now have been as source of sustainable jobs as indeed it is in Denmark and Germany as well as helping to lessen our dependence on imported fossil fuels.
Today, we have the opportunity to avoid making a similar mistake with microgeneration. This is a technology that needs to be embraced and encouraged. We should open ourselves up to its opportunities, challenges and ultimately great rewards by promoting a national microgeneration initiative.