Ireland sees the risks but acts too late and pays for it every time

Across energy, housing and infrastructure, Ireland has a problem with timing and governance, writes Professor Aoife Foley

The Kinsale gas field declined and ceased production around 2020 without a replacement system. Ireland now relies heavily on imported gas.

Ireland does not have a problem with ambition. It has a problem with timing and governance.

Across energy, housing and infrastructure, the same pattern repeats. Risks are visible early. But decisions are delayed. By the time action is taken, it is reactive, expensive and often temporary. 

This is not simply about competence. It reflects deeper issues in how decisions are made and delivered across the system. What is missing is timing and coordination.

Energy and exposure 

Energy exposes this most clearly. The cycle of rising oil prices and emergency supports seen in 1973, 1979, 2022 and 2023 is repeating with the current Gulf crisis. Government interventions stabilise conditions temporarily, but the underlying exposure remains.

When decisions are delayed, what's lost is precision. What begins as a targeted response becomes broad, expensive and difficult to unwind. The timing of the current crisis reflects this pattern. 

Risks were visible in early March as tensions in the Gulf escalated, yet the response was slow. The issue moved through St Patrick’s weekend and towards Easter, when government slows. By the time protests emerged, decisions were rushed and unco-ordinated.

Delays of weeks increase exposure and remove better options. Early decisions align with long-term needs. Late decisions are driven by urgency and may stabilise the system, but do not improve it.

These oil shocks do not stop at oil. In Ireland, they feed directly into gas. The current crisis is increasing gas price volatility, and because gas often sets the price of electricity, the impact is immediate.

Under the EU marginal pricing model, the most expensive generator needed to meet demand sets the price for all electricity in that hour. In Ireland, that is very often gas. 

I describe this as pintenomics. If a pub needs 100 pints and the last costs €10, every pint is sold at €10. We accept this because without that final €10 pint, demand cannot be met. And when that final pint is gas in our electricity system, then the entire system is exposed to gas price shocks.

This is Ireland’s core vulnerability. It is not just that we use gas. It is that we rely on it often enough to set the price. Renewables are essential, but security of supply also requires storage, capacity and back-up generation.

Without this, the system remains exposed.

Kinsale and missed resilience 

Exploration drilling in Irish waters ended without a parallel strategy for security of supply or storage. The Kinsale gas field declined and ceased production around 2020 without a replacement system.

Ireland now relies heavily on imported gas despite well understood risks, while storage and system flexibility remain underdeveloped.

Kinsale illustrates the failure. Discovered in 1971 and brought into production in 1978, it produced about 57 billion cubic metres of gas and peaked at 2.8 billion cubic metres per year. 

Repurposing it could have provided between one and three billion cubic metres of storage, equivalent to roughly two to six months of Ireland’s demand.

Instead, it was allowed to decline without transition. There was no clear decision to repurpose it. 

Storage was treated as a commercial issue rather than a strategic requirement, and responsibility was shared but not owned. Decommissioning became the default.

Kinsale did not fail because it lacked value. It failed because the system did not require it to continue in another role. 

The underlying issue is governance.

A governance system not fit for purpose 

Ireland’s governance structures were designed for a different State. Decision-making and delivery are closely intertwined, but responsibility is diffused across departments, agencies and political actors. 

The Dáil spends significant time on constituency casework rather than system-level delivery, while the role of the Seanad remains unclear in a modern system. At local level, fragmentation slows progress. 

Cork continues to face governance challenges between city and county. Dublin operates through multiple overlapping bodies. The economy is now larger and more complex, but the system has not evolved at the same pace.

This is reflected in delivery. Infrastructure delivery does not match Ireland’s ambition.

Denmark separates policy from delivery through agencies and empowered municipalities. Switzerland decentralises authority across cantons and municipalities, supported by strong fiscal rules. 

Ireland distributes responsibility. Denmark simplifies it. Switzerland localises it. That is the difference.

Denmark began offshore wind in 1991 and scaled continuously. Ireland began at Arklow Bank in 2003 and has yet to scale meaningfully. 

In energy security, Denmark maintains around one billion cubic metres of gas storage. Switzerland secures storage abroad. Ireland has effectively none.

Copenhagen’s Metro, approved in 1996, opened in 2002 and expanded to over 40 km by 2019, including the 15.5 km Cityringen delivered for approximately €3 billion. Switzerland delivered the 57 km Gotthard Base Tunnel between 1999 and 2016 at a cost of around €11–12 billion. 

Ireland’s MetroLink, at around 19 km and projected to cost approximately €9 billion, remains unbuilt after more than 20 years.

Professor Aoife Foley: 'Ireland distributes responsibility. Denmark simplifies it. Switzerland localises it. That is the difference.'

In healthcare, Denmark is delivering around 16 major hospitals over a decade for approximately €5–6 billion. Ireland’s National Children’s Hospital has exceeded €2.2 billion and remains incomplete.

These are not differences in capability. They are differences in governance, sequencing and accountability. 

When responsibility is split, delivery slows. When ownership is unclear, outcomes drift. Ireland’s challenge is not a lack of capability. It is that responsibility is too often shared, and therefore not owned.

What needs to change 

First, Ireland must reduce its exposure to gas as the marginal price setter by accelerating renewables, grid integration, system flexibility and energy efficiency.

Second, it must build resilience across the system through storage, transport, housing and water infrastructure, ensuring capacity, security of supply and long-term planning are delivered in parallel.

Third, it must reform how decisions translate into delivery, separating policy from execution, with clear accountability, binding timelines and institutions that deliver beyond political cycles. 

These are standard features of systems that work. Ireland does not fail to see the risks. It fails to act on them in time.

Every delay increases costs for households, deepens the burden on the State and embeds structural vulnerability. Each crisis feels new. The failure behind it is not. Until timing changes, outcomes will not.

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Unless governance is redesigned to act early and deliver at pace, Ireland will continue to recognise the problem, respond under pressure and pay more than it should.

Ireland’s problem is not just energy. It is infrastructure, governance and delivery across the system.

• Professor Aoife Foley is chair in Net Zero Infrastructure at The University of Manchester. Listen back to her discussing Ireland and the energy crisis on The Deirdre O'Shaughnessy Podcast