Ireland's much anticipated Home Energy Saving Scheme, which it is hoped will facilitate the retrofitting of 100,000 Irish houses per annum with insulation and energy saving technologies, has finally been launched by Irish Energy Minister Eamon Ryan TD. The scheme, which could create thousands of Irish construction jobs opportunities, will be initially rolled out on a pilot scheme basis in North Tipperary, Co Limerick, Co Clare and Dundalk before a full launch across the country in 2009.

It was hoped last year that the housing renovation market would replace many of the construction jobs lost in the Irish residential slowdown. But growth in this niche was not as fast as first anticipated. So the €100m 10 year grant scheme should fuel significant opportunities for specialist Irish construction jobs over the coming years.

The pilot scheme will have an allocation of €5million in grants with some 2,000 homes being retro-fitted in this first phase. Each householder will receive State financial contributions not exceeding €2,600 per home. The scheme will be administered by Sustainable Energy Ireland (SEI).

Services and businessed that are expected to benefit most from the new grants are energy assessors, insulation suppliers, low-emission double glazed window suppliers, heating control systems manufacturers and boiler manufacturers.

This will be good news for those who are SEI registered energy assessors, plumbers, fitters and other trades people as well as skilled construction labourers who are seeking construction job opportunities in Ireland.

Energy Minister Eamon Ryan has set a target of 1million homes to be retroffited over the next 10 years.