I refer to Martin Galea's excellent rebuttal of arguments against retention of the surcharge capping for industrial heavy consumers (Energy Performance, August 21).
Of course, as an industrialist, Martin Galea is speaking from the opposite end of the spectrum. The arguments he puts forward are valid and quite convincing, but the fact remains that there has to be a certain amount of belt tightening in respect of energy use and that this should also include our privileged high industrial consumers.
More importantly, Mr Galea's viewpoint does not alter the fact that people will not be motivated to save energy if they do not pay a realistic price for their energy consumption. This was precisely the object of quoting an example of a wasteful practice. Exhortation alone will not induce people to go about carefully with energy - but making them pay a realistic price for it will. The FOI recommendation that enterprises benefiting from the surcharge capping system should be asked to submit energy performance plans and undertake a commitment to reduce energy consumption, possibly through use of energy generated from sources other than fossil fuels, is most welcome.
Also welcome is the now universal concept of investing in an energy efficiency culture.
This would indeed be a win-win situation, but the question remains: will our enterprises be sufficiently motivated to implement energy-saving measures if they continue to be pampered? Maybe a compromise solution can be found, possibly through making capping conditional upon a firm commitment to conduct energy performance audits and introduce energy-saving measures accordingly, as hinted at by the FOI.
Incidentally, no claim was made that consumption of electricity in industry increased after capping was introduced; neither was a sudden removal of this system proposed.
On the contrary, the suggestion was of stepwise removal of the surcharge in order to allow enterprises time to absorb the impact of the increased energy price and permit them to adapt to the new conditions, possibly by installing energy-generating appliances.
Finally, the recent upward spiral in oil prices is not a transient "rough patch" - the predictions are that oil prices will continue to rise.
This is all the more reason why our industries must adapt to operating more economically - both for the sake of ensuring their survival and for climate change.