In addition to the money for the so-called East-West Interconnector, Electricity Supply Board (ESB), Ireland’s state-run electrical utility, was granted a €200m loan to build a series of wind farms.
The East-West Interconnector, which will run 256 kilometres between Ireland and Wales, has long been seen as the lynchpin of the development of Ireland’s vast wind resources.
The interconnector has spent years on the drawing board of state-owned EirGrid, which controls the electricity transmission network in much of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
