The ESB should be sold for €15billion and the cash used to develop new forms of energy, Fianna Fáil TD Barry Cowen has said.

ESB is the dominant provider of electricity in the country and also the largest supplier of domestic energy via its retail division, Electric Ireland.

But after a series of power alerts during the hottest summer in decades, the Laois- Offaly TD has proposed breaking up one of the country's most iconic companies.

"Ownership of the ESB should no longer be the key determinant for Government of how it operates," he said.

"The consequence of the failure to reform is that while households and businesses throughout the country struggle and hundreds of thousands of people fight to survive, having to choose between heating and eating, the ESB, through its various entities, keeps announcing bumper profits."

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Mr Cowen said the ESB had serious questions to answer about its performance in several areas.

These included questioning its role in energy costs, how public service obligations benefit the ESB, questioning regulation, and seeking an investigation of manipulation of the energy market.

"There needs to be a European Union investigation of State aid, and the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission should investigate the ESB's price hikes for householders," he said.

"It is my view that ESB's dominance of the energy generation market has resulted in us now having a shortage of power sources and a political nightmare. While the State owns the ESB, it cannot dictate the price of energy. The regulators and EU law do this.

"The State finds itself in the worst of all worlds, owning a company that charges high prices for electricity, forcing out competition, but then being accountable for a market that is short of energy in a country brimming with generation possibilities."

He also said that "we cannot ever allow ourselves again to be in this situation where we lack energy security".

Mr Cowen added that as ESB has "failed to invest in new infrastructure", it should be sold. He commented: "We should use the money from the sale of the ESB, probably €15billion-plus, to power our move to more sustainable sources such as offshore wind and the transmission and storage infrastructure to support it."

Staff, customers and other interested parties "should be allowed to participate in the sale proceeds but the bulk must be used to invest in the future and ensure we have a functioning energy market", he said. Mr Cowen added: "If we take the right action now on regulation and ownership, we will not be in this situation for another decade where we lack energy security and are trapped in high prices and bonkers decisions by regulators."

He also said Ireland needs to grasp opportunities in offshore wind generation.

"We are already years behind the UK. As well as powering ourselves sustainably and cost-effectively, we can also be the renewable energy exporter and backbone to a new green Europe, creating well-paid jobs here," he said.

"Ireland needs to leapfrog Scotland and others and become the global leader of an industry that could be worth €300billion by 2050 - more or less the size of the Irish economy now."

Mr Cowen also called for a stand-alone Department of Energy "to replace the scenario where at the minute six Government departments and as many Government agencies hold different parts of the energy jigsaw".

The Government, he said, "must move to reform the situation where it is now stuck with regulators who seem not to have the national interest as their key objective".

"The European Commission has commenced an investigation but the Government should act now to ensure our regulators behave in the public and economic interests of the State," he added.