Electricity Grid
Dail Éireann — 2026-01-29
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Darragh O'Brien (FF), Dublin Fingal East

As I said, the meeting was important and gives the Deputy a clear view of what is happening. Work is under way in Tuam. Recent outages in the wider Tuam area and surrounding areas have primarily been caused by lightning events, timber vegetation, as the Deputy mentioned, wildlife and equipment failure on the network. There is a major programme of pole replacement. We have work to do on forestry corridors and timber cutting. Storm Éowyn brought down years of timber that would have been harvested.
We are bringing forward legislation to clarify the rights the ESB already has because they go back to the 1929 electricity Act in terms of access to land. That will be done this year. My Department is working with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. It is incumbent on those who own forests, be they privately owned, State forests or owned by institutions, that they are managed properly. That is why the licensing arrangements for new forestry need to reflect that. It cannot always be down to the State to manage forestry on private land. We have to put the responsibility on landowners.
The Deputy mentioned the upgrading of the existing Ballygar 38 kV substation. That will have a very positive effect on the area. In my constituency, in north county Dublin, in particular in Donabate, there have been regular outages which has been rectified by the installation of a new substation. Many more of these will be delivered in the coming period. The winter resilience plan is under way. After Storm Éowyn, it was the first time that the grid had been fully surveyed nationwide across the 26 Counties and, indeed, across the 32 Counties because we operate a single electricity market. That was done mainly through drones, which I will discuss shortly.
I assure the Deputy that I will work directly with him on the specific issues in his constituency. He has articulated very well the impact they have had on residents. Things are now starting to improve. A major investment programme over the next five-year term will make a difference.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-01-29/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:34+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-01-29