DUBLIN (Reuters) – Ireland must speed up substantial investment in its electricity grid to prepare for future weather events after 74,000 homes, farms and businesses remained without power a week after Storm Eowyn battered the country, Prime Minister Micheál Martin said.
ESB Networks, the country’s energy provider, has restored power to 694,000 homes and businesses with the help of crews from Europe but says some customers, many in remote locations, will remain in the dark until Feb. 6.
The recently re-elected government has already pledged a major capital investment programme to fix creaking infrastructure, partly through the use of a 14 billion euro ($14.52 billion) Apple tax windfall.
“I have already asked for work to be done to accelerate investment in the (electricity) grid, to future proof it and make it more resilient,” Martin told reporters on Friday.
“There will be a need for really substantial investment in our electricity grid into the future because if you look over the last 10 years, the number and severity of storms of this kind is growing,” Martin said. “Climate change is now having an impact to a significant degree in our country.”
($1 = 0.9643 euros)
(Reporting by Padraic Halpin; Editing by Catarina Demony)
