alt Hacker News> I'd add that this is only part of the equation because: what do you do on an overcast day with no wind?
Battery technology is really, really getting there.
And in the absence of any more improvements here (unlikely) you integrate your grids with other countries. That's harder for Ireland, but it's still worth doing.
Does this battery technology grow on trees in Ireland, or does it exist in a foreign (and perhaps one day adversial) nation, like China?
The sheer number of people in this thread saying, "we need renewables to be independent!", from countries that don't actually manufacture anything, is astonishing.