Wind energy accounted for more than a third of Ireland’s electricity generation in 2023, according to new data released today by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
The figures form part of the latest update on Ireland’s progress towards achieving United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7: Affordable and Clean Energy.
The CSO report shows that 40.4% of electricity in 2023 came from renewable sources, with wind contributing a substantial 34.1%.
Overall, the renewable energy share (RES) of total energy use stood at 15.3%, with electricity making up 10.1%, heat 2.7%, and transport 2.4%.
Commenting on the release, Mary Smyth, Statistician, said: "This latest release on United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) has data on six indicators for Ireland, divided over two chapters: Affordable and Clean Energy, and Infrastructure.
“Data are presented in categories relevant to the indicators and geographical location, where possible."
She added: "The UN SDGs and their associated indicators are, by design, wide-ranging in their coverage.
“As a result, the Irish data is provided by a number of sources including government departments, official organisations, and international organisations such as the UN.
“This release for Goal 7 was developed in collaboration with the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI)."
The report highlights challenges in the transport sector, where renewable energy usage was significantly lower.
Only 5.7% of transport energy came from renewable sources, primarily biodiesel (4.9%).
On the residential front, Census 2022 data reveals that oil remains the dominant heating source, used by 38.9% of households, followed by natural gas (32.7%).
More than half of households in areas such as Longford, Mayo and Roscommon still rely on oil heating.
In urban centres, however, electricity use is growing, with 23.4% of Dublin City and 22.8% of Galway City households using it to heat their homes in 2022—up from 8.6% nationally in 2016 to 11.8% in 2022.
Ireland also contributed €0.7m in 2022 to clean energy R&D efforts in developing countries.
This is the seventh release in the CSO’s UN SDG indicator series, and the second focused on Goal 7.
Data are collected in collaboration with the SEAI, and presented through Ireland’s SDGs Data Hub on the GeoHive platform, part of a joint initiative by the CSO, Ordnance Survey Ireland and Esri Ireland.
