The Government has estimated that an additional 2,000 jobs will be created this year through its revamped energy retrofit scheme, the details of which were outlined as part of the Government's jobs initiative yesterday.
An additional €30m of funding is to be made available to the project, which will enable the owners of private houses, business premises and public buildings access grants to make their buildings more energy efficient.
The Better Energy programme will take three existing energy savings schemes and combine them.
An extra €30m of funding will then be added to the €60m already provided in the Budget for energy efficiency schemes.
The Government says the extra funding it is providing will lead to the private sector providing a further €30m of finance.
Taken together, the new and existing funding will create almost 6,000 jobs this year.
A payment scheme will be devised so that those availing of the retrofit scheme will not have to pay for the work upfront, but instead will make repayments over time as they make savings.
Also as part of the plan, 25 energy suppliers, including the ESB and Bord Gáis, will sign up to help deliver extra energy savings.
Details of the Better Energy programme and the grants available will be available from Monday from the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland website.
