Ireland's response to the Strait of Hormuz being closed

What do we do about a huge amount of energy no longer flowing out of the Strait of Hormuz?

"Households urged to cut fuel use as Ireland braces for oil crisis"

Walking, cycling, putting on a jumper and keeping the heat lower are good ideas but on a global scale they won't effect the price of energy. And even on the Irish scale won't delay problems by a lot.

We can conserve joules and we can produce more joules on the island. 

But can we expand our energy supply quickly? China added 93gw of solar in May last year. 2 days of that would mean whenever it was sunny Ireland would have a huge excess of power.

This week we had 1.5 gw of solar at some points. And with that's 6gw addition it would have been over all our electricity. They added a GW of wind a day that month so 2 days of those additions would also help a lot here.

Adding solar is not a simple as buying some panels and waiting for them to arrive. Solar farms are easier to add GW to the grid fast. Industialised solar farm rollout happens now. Sending people up on roofs is less watts per worker per day then large numbers of panels being put onto a field. 

For it to be useful in this crises I think the government could allow

All wind farms to have permission to add solar to them. Wind is strongest on winter nights and solar on summer days. Having both in one place using a wire that's already there doesn't lose you that much power. Solar and Wind combined has planning issues in Ireland, but thats one thing the government do control.

The government could also give solar planning permission to fields within  a few km of a substation. If that rule is too free focus on those near cities. Already sometimes we cannot move electricity from the west to Dublin often 

This crisis could end tomorrow and what I will suggest take some time to work. Also it could go on years and it will not help in a dark windless fortnight in January 2027. But having a few extra GWh put into the Irish grid regularly is no small improvement. I think we do that with some small changes to our planning rules. 

6 months ago would have been a better time to install shed loads of more solar and wind here. But the second best time is today.