Nuclear Plants Dail Éireann — 2026-04-16 ============================================================ Malcolm Byrne (FF), Wicklow-Wexford Our transition to renewables is critical. The Minister of State knows that I strongly support all of the investment that we are seeing in wind and solar, and I want it to happen much more quickly. The question is around future capacity, when we are looking to 2040 and beyond, and whether enough will be generated even at that stage by renewables. Given what we have seen with the types of models we are talking about, I specifically asked about small modular nuclear reactors with regard to being able to fuel our future digital infrastructure, for instance, data centres, in the context of this being a digital economy. I believe it is something that needs to be considered. I accept this is not something that is going to happen immediately, but when we are looking at Ireland's future energy needs going to 2040 and 2050, this green technology, which it is, has to be part of the discussion. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-16/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:49+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-04-16