The Irish government has announced that 479MW of onshore wind and 796MW of solar — 19 new wind farms and 63 PV projects — have been provisionally awarded contracts under its first national renewables auction.

The average winning bid price for the technology-neutral Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS) tender was €74.08 ($87.83) per MWh — down from the €80.25/MWh paid out under the previous REFIT support scheme.

Ireland aims to supply 70% of its power needs from renewables by 2030 — up from 33.2% at the end of 2018. The 1,469GWh of onshore wind and 767GWh of solar awarded represent roughly 8% of Ireland’s annual electricity demand.

The tender marks a turning point for solar power in Ireland, which is not known for its sunny weather. At the end of if 2018, only 24.2MW of PV had been installed — none of which were utility-scale projects. By contrast, a total of 4.14GW of wind power had been commissioned in the country by the end of 2019.

The winning bids still remain subject to government approval, and the names of the winning projects or their developers have not been officially revealed.

Under the RESS scheme, project owners will receive a guaranteed power price under a contracts for difference system — in which the government pays a top-up on the wholesale power price so that the developer always receive its agreed “strike price”, while the developer will pay money back to the government when the wholesale power price is higher than the strike price.

A further three RESS auctions are expected to take place before the end of 2025.

Wind

Ireland awards 1.3GW of wind and solar in landmark renewables auction