Rabbitte: Ireland can easily meet European renewable energy targets

The Government wants to make renewable energy one of Ireland’s key exports in order to capitalise on European regulations on the percentage of renewable energy a company is required to produce.

Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte, told a meeting of the British Irish Parliamentary Assembly that renewable energy was a government priority.

“Ireland’s overarching strategic objective is not just to make renewable energy an increasingly significant component of our domestic energy supply by 2020 but also to make it a significant component of our export sector. We have in Ireland a rich and abundant wind and ocean energy potential which I firmly believe can be harvested and exported as a real economic opportunity for this island,” he said.