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Offshore Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (ORESS)
From Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications
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Ireland’s second offshore wind energy auction, ORESS 2.1 will be the first auction to take place in Phase Two and will procure up to 900 Megawatts of capacity from a State-selected provisional designated area known as a Designated Maritime Area Plan (DMAP) off Ireland’s south coast.
We have prepared a series of indicative roadmap scenarios that set out the steps and indicative timelines to ORESS 2.1.
The Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC) held an ORESS 2.1 industry briefing session, providing updates on workstreams related to the upcoming ORESS 2.1 auction on Monday 15 January 2024.
The event, which was held in-person and virtually, involved presentations from DECC, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU), the Marine Institute and the Maritime Area Regulatory Authority (MARA), followed by a Q&A session.
The ORESS 1 provisional and final auction results are now confirmed and available on the EirGrid website.
The Government has approved the Terms and Conditions for the first offshore RESS auction, ORESS 1. Owing to the specific scale and nature of offshore wind farms, dedicated auctions are initially required to support this technology in Ireland. At least three offshore auctions are currently planned this decade. Due to the relatively long development timelines of offshore wind projects, only the first two of these auctions can be expected to contribute towards our 2030 5GW installed capacity target. Subject to sufficient competition being available (as independently determined by the CRU), the intention is therefore to scale these auctions accordingly, also allowing for expected post-auction project attrition rates.
Offshore wind projects must reach a number of milestones to be eligible to compete in ORESS 1, specifically, project must be awarded a Maritime Area Consent (MAC) from the Minister for Environment, Climate and Communications, and a Grid Connection Assessment (GCA) from EirGrid, the offshore Transmission System Operator. Both MACs and GCAs are expected to issue to the first batch of offshore wind projects before the end of 2022.
The Terms and Conditions for the ORESS 1 auction were published on 9 November 2022, updated on 27 March and 6 April 2023.
The ORESS 1 Community Benefit Fund Rulebook sets out the working relationship between each Generator and Fund Administrator, provides details on how each fund must be established and conducted, including regulatory and compliance obligations.
DECC held an ORESS 1 stakeholder workshop, for Phase 1 projects, on the published ORESS 1 Terms and Conditions on Wednesday 7 December 2022.
The event, which was held in-person and virtually, involved presentations from DECC, CRU and EirGrid. A question and answer session followed