Madam, - I refer to your Editorial entitled "The Energy Challenge" (July 23rd), which stated: "Efforts to create effective competition within the electricity market were successfully resisted by the ESB".
I am astounded at the inaccuracy of this assertion. The reality is quite the contrary, as any informed analyst of the electricity market can testify.
For the record, far from resisting competition, the ESB vigorously facilitated market opening since its introduction in 2001 including the following measures. The ESB put in place complex IT systems, on time and on budget, to allow 100 per cent market opening in February 2005, two years ahead of the EU deadline.
In partnership with the Government, the ESB agreed over six years ago to reduce its generation market share to 60 per cent to allow room for competing plant; this target has already been achieved and our market share will further drop to 40 per cent in the new single electricity market.
The ESB has provided power to competing suppliers at discounted prices to allow it to attract customers away from us. We have entered long-term offtake contracts with independent producers Tynagh, Aughanish/Alumina and Eden- derry Power, as well as a large number of wind generators, effectively allowing them to finance their projects.
We have periodically switched off cheaper plant to allow independent generating stations to run 24 hours per day.
The ESB agreed with the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER) in November 2006 to close/divest 1500MW of generation plant to create the room for further competitive entry into the market.
While the aforementioned, and indeed many other initiatives, focused on facilitating competition, the ESB also invested some €3.5 billion upgrading the electricity networks to meet rising demand and to allow new generators to connect to the system.
Finally, the ESB has been an active and enthusiastic supporter of the single electricity market, due to go live later this year, for the greater economies of scale and competitive dynamic it will bring to benefit all customers. To suggest, as your Editorial writer did, that the ESB has resisted competition is ill-informed and simply wrong. - Yours, etc,
EOGHAN Ó NEACHTAIN, Public Affairs Manager, ESB, Lower Ftizwilliam Street, Dublin 2.