TSO Investment Planning & Delivery

PR5 Multi-Year Balanced Scorecard 2023-2027

Ørsted Submission January 2023

The Ørsted vision is a world that runs entirely on green energy.    

Ørsted develops, constructs, and operates offshore and onshore wind farms, solar farms, energy storage facilities, renewable hydrogen and green fuels facilities, and bioenergy plants. Ørsted also provides energy products to its customers. Ørsted is the only energy company in the world with a science-based net-zero emissions target as validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), and Ørsted aims to deliver a net-positive biodiversity impact from all new renewable energy projects we commission from 2030 at the latest.    

In Ireland, Ørsted has a team of over 90 people and owns and operates a 360MW portfolio of onshore wind farms. Our ambition for our Irish operations is to significantly grow our asset base across wind, solar and storage in the coming decade to play a significant role in delivering Orsted’s global goal of 50GW renewables by 2030.  

It is positive to see a transparent scoring card being introduced for the delivery and connection of much needed transmission and distribution infrastructure. We encourage regular updates on progress between the TSO, DSO and the CRU beyond the formality of end of year reporting to ensure that progress is well understood on an ongoing basis, during this critical phase of the energy transition. The publication of the Network Delivery Portfolio (NDP), one of the documents which provides the baseline for performance evaluation, should include brief project descriptors. At present it only provides the project name and CP number. This is in line with the principle of transparency being brought forward in this consultation. We note the way Transmission Owners in the UK provide quarterly updates on infrastructure projects with project overviews.1

It is essential that investment in grid capacity and delivery of infrastructure is prioritised and increased. We would seek assurance that the baseline Network Delivery Portfolio (NDP) for 2023 used for assessing performance includes (1) the shallow connection projects for ECP2.2 projects which were due offers per ECP timelines by the end of December 2022 and (2) any associated network upgrades. While we acknowledge that all offers may not have been issued or accepted by the time it is intended to publish the 2023 NDP, the projects should be listed in the NDP to ensure they are included in the scoring process and that there is accountability and timely delivery of these connections. If the offers are not accepted, they will not affect the performance outturn as the project would be cancelled.

Additionally, the Network Delivery Portfolio (NDP) must be dynamic so that new projects can be added as they come on stream. New projects can happen for several reasons including: successful participants to the capacity market receiving offers outside of the normal ECP process and changes due to the revision of Shaping Our Electricity Future.

In relation to the Performance Assessment and Incentive Award Scales which currently stand at 40% for investment planning, 40% delivery and 20% timelines we encourage a strong focus on project completion. We are encouraged by the inclusion of this element, and it is essential that it remains strong or is further strengthened. With the information provided it is not clear how the outturn availability is measured. The TOP programme is updated on a regular basis throughout the year, changes are inevitable due to unforeseen circumstances. When the TSO is scheduling outages for new customer connections or indeed for customer maintenance reasons, some flexibility may be needed in outage dates due to availability of contractors or equipment coming from overseas on the customer side etc. It is important that the method of calculating the outturn for TOP delivery does not penalise the TSO for facilitating customer requests to reschedule outages.

Finally, we are keen to ensure that the maintenance of this scorecard by the TSO and CRU is resourced by additional resource and does not pull team members away from other functions critical to the delivery of renewable energy.

EirGrid PR5 Investment Planning and Delivery Multi-Year Plan 2023-2027 Consultation - Submissions

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