Our energy policy is overly ambitious

The cancelling of an agreement with the UK to export wind energy and the shelving of the 40 wind farms in the midlands show that our renewable energy policy is over-ambitious.

The spending of billions of euro on the Grid 25 project to upgrade electricity needs to be questioned.

The Energy Minister Pat Rabbitte has set up an expert panel to assess putting the 400,000-volt power lines underground. This panel is chaired by the former Supreme Court Judge, Catherine McGuinness, and includes the economist Colm McCarthy, John Fitzgerald of the ESRI, Professor Keith Bell of the University of Strathclyde, and Dr Karen Foley of the School of Landscape Architecture at UCD.