ESB To Spend EUR8m On Re-Branding

Under a plan published earlier this year, ESB will be allowed to set its own electricity prices after it changes the name of its supply business and when its share of the market falls to 60%.

Currently, its prices are laid down by the regulator.

Fine Gael's Energy spokesman Leo Varadkar described the re-branding as "a total waste of money" that would inevitably add to the cost for business and households.

But Minister for Energy Eamonn Ryan insisted this would not be the case.

"This is all in the name of bringing prices down," he said, "Re-branding is a necessary precondition of deregulating the domestic supply market.

"We can see that existing competition has brought about price wars between electricity suppliers as they compete for business."

Consumers will see the new name on bills and letters from April 2011, but the old ESB logo will remain alongside it for another 12 months.

The old name will still be retained by ESB Networks, which maintains the grid, and ESB International, which has interests around the world.

The State-owned ESB had a monopoly on electricity supply in Ireland until the market was opened to competition in 2005.

Bord Gais, the state controlled natural gas company and Airtricity, a private company specialising in green energy are both now providing electricity to thousands of customers.

ESB also plans to enter the natural gas market.

There has been a lot of speculation that Bord Gais and ESB will be privatised in a bid to raise much needed money for the Exchequer in the next few years.