Great article but Ireland’s energy transition: the wolf in sheep’s clothing 🧵 1/ Wind and solar are essential, but weather-dependent. Nuclear can provide firm, low-carbon power. A resilient grid needs a balanced mix of renewables, dependable generation, storage and interconnection—not just more installed capacity. 2/ Data centres need reliable 24/7 electricity. Like other large industrial users. Keeping them online requires firm energy, balancing, frequency control, inertia, voltage support and grid reinforcement. These are real costs, not accounting details. 3/ Enter the cap-and-floor model. Revenue floors can reduce interconnector investment risk; caps limit retained revenues under the scheme’s rules. But who ultimately bears the downside, and who benefits from the upside? And they like to whiff of renewables and it’s proved a good business model. 4/ Merchant development fragments the system into privately financed assets: interconnectors, batteries, LDES and grid services. Each pursues its own revenue streams, while the electricity system must coordinate the whole. Revenue stacking can be efficient—but overlapping subsidies and socialised costs need scrutiny. 5/ Here’s the danger: private investors secure regulatory support, data centres secure the power they need, and households and SMEs may absorb part of the wider network and system costs through electricity prices and regulated charges. The actual allocation must be demonstrated, not assumed. 6/ Nuclear, wind, solar, storage and interconnection should be planned as one integrated system. Firm low-carbon generation can complement renewables; storage shifts energy through time; interconnectors share resources across borders. None replaces the need for proper grid engineering. 7/ If large energy users drive new infrastructure demand, they should bear an appropriate share of the costs. If the public helps de-risk private investment, consumers should receive transparent, measurable benefits in return. The wolf in sheep’s clothing isn’t clean energy. It’s a fragmented development model that can privatise returns while spreading risks and costs across the public. Ireland needs a dependable, low-carbon electricity system—not a blank cheque for investors or an assumption that households will pick up the tab. 🧵👇🧐 Just a few thoughts and observations.